300

[Canadian Blue]

Besides, it leaves the real women for real men.

I'm going to ask you this question once more, and I'll include another question that you failed to answer.

What are "real men"?

What are "real women"?

[ScottSA]

Besides, it leaves the real women for real men.

I'm going to ask you this question once more, and I'll include another question that you failed to answer.

What are "real men"?

What are "real women"?

See? If you don't know what a real man is, me telling you isn't going to help. Keep hiding your eyes from masculine men lest they give you a woody, and don't worry about who is a real woman...they are only interested in men who know what masculinity is all about.

Anyway, I'm tired of this silly game, so I'll let you and pipsqueak Figleaf continue your desperate ridicule of masculinity, and get the last word in. Toodles, boys!

[Figleaf]

I'd say the folks it brought into the open are the males who are so confused about their own sexuality that they view bare chested men as somehow "homoerotic".

Wouldn't you think that homosexuals are interested in bare chested men?

[Canadian Blue]

See? If you don't know what a real man is, me telling you isn't going to help. Keep hiding your eyes from masculine men lest they give you a woody, and don't worry about who is a real woman...they are only interested in men who know what masculinity is all about.

So, am I supposed to buy some speedo, get a spear, and then fight the Persian's?

I've always thought that the mark of a man was his compassion, but that's just me.

Let me guess what a real woman is, the kind that cooks, bakes, cleans, and make babies; and don't question a man's authority. I wouldn't be surprised if the vast majority of the wife beaters out there consider themselves more masculine for putting women in line.

Anyway, I'm tired of this silly game, so I'll let you and pipsqueak Figleaf continue your desperate ridicule of masculinity, and get the last word in. Toodles, boys!

You're a real life Col. Frank Fitts.

40) Col. Frank Fitts in AMERICAN BEAUTY (Chris Cooper) As I mentioned before when discussing the character of Ricky Fitts from this stunning 1999 film, there were many memorable characters in AMERICAN BEAUTY, and one of the most unique was Ricky's father, Col. Frank Fitts, played by the always great Chris Cooper. When we first saw Frank, we see him as a bigoted Marine who can't stand the idea of homosexuals, and rules over his son with absolute power to try to keep him in line. By film's end, one of the biggest surprises involves his character, as we begin to see the torment inside him. When he finally is bold enough to admit to his true self, only to be dejected, the image is immensely powerful, as he walks into the pouring rain, only to be swallowed by the night. An absolutely wonderful performance of an unforgettable character.

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/academy_awards/102030

[moderateamericain]

Ill take the bait Canadian, A real man is a person who puts his family and friends before his own needs. A real man protects his family and the people he cares about at the risk of even his own life. A real man evaluates a situation and makes a judgment based on his best judgment. A real man can handle any situation that comes up in life and even if he cant he takes it on anyways. A real man takes responsibility for his own actions. A real man recognizes the need to protect his land from Domestic and Foreign attackers. A real man takes control of a situation through action and does not hide behind only words. To me, those are the signs and qualities that i feel a man should have.

What made King Leonidas a man wasn't the Armor he wore, or the Strength of his arm. It was the principle's he wielded. They were his strength. The loyalty and recognition of other men. Do you think he would have been able to rally those men to defend that passed in designer jeans and a fancy hair doo? Because i don't and i wouldn't follow a man who cared more about his appearance then his abilities.

[Canadian Blue]

Ill take the bait Canadian, A real man is a person who puts his family and friends before his own needs. A real man protects his family and the people he cares about at the risk of even his own life. A real man evaluates a situation and makes a judgment based on his best judgment. A real man can handle any situation that comes up in life and even if he cant he takes it on anyways. A real man takes responsibility for his own actions. A real man recognizes the need to protect his land from Domestic and Foreign attackers. A real man takes control of a situation through action and does not hide behind only words. To me, those are the signs and qualities that i feel a man should have.

Thanks for providing an actual answer, something that ScottSA was unable to do.

What made King Leonidas a man wasn't the Armor he wore, or the Strength of his arm. It was the principle's he wielded. They were his strength. The loyalty and recognition of other men. Do you think he would have been able to rally those men to defend that passed in designer jeans and a fancy hair doo? Because i don't and i wouldn't follow a man who cared more about his appearance then his abilities.

If we are invaded by the people wanting to instate a Global Caliphate, then we'll see who is willing to stand up and defend their values. I think if we ever get invaded people won't care much about their appearances.

[Canadian Blue]

I'd like to add on however, that it's easy to say what should make a man back in Canada; where we are safe and for the most part living in comfort. Most of us may never have to encounter a situation such as invasion or attack from another nation. If that time comes however, I think people would actually be surprised by who has the most moral courage to stand up against injustices. I myself think that what it means to be a man is that one should stand up for justice, be compassionate, and be honourable. That includes dealing with people by imagining what life is like in someone else's shoes, finding solutions to complex problems, and working hard for your family and friends. But in saying that, I disagree with this idea that in order to be a "real man", one must have a superiority complex, or for that matter simply conform to this ideal which seems to be set more by movies, television, and music. I don't think that a "real man" is one who is very willing to accept violence, and I don't think that a "real man" needs to embrace some sort of image which has been set more by society than anything else.

[White Doors]

I disagree with this idea that in order to be a "real man", one must have a superiority complex

Who said that? In fact, the definition of a real man that moderate did excellently would actually be the opposite would it not? They are to sacrificve themselves for their loved one's? That is not a superiority complex.

[M.Dancer]

Personally, I'm not particularly interested in maleness or masculinity.

Not that there's anything wrong with being interested in that subject........I know plenty of women who are, God love them.

[ScottSA]

I think moderateamerican's defintion is about as good as it gets. Concepts like honor, duty and courage have been devalued for the last several decades, because they entail something called sacrifice...long out of vogue after decades of decadent 'me'ism and feminization, and it's long past time that it reawakened. Thank God it is, finally.

What CB seems not to realize is that there's a time for softness, or 'compassion' as he calls it, and a time for strength, or 'violence' as he dismissively calls it. Sometimes softness doesn't work. I suppose the Spartans could have dressed as flower children and greeted the Persians, in which case Leonidas would have lived to a ripe old age in peaceful vassalage to Xerxes. That would have been the 'compassionate' thing to do, the 'mature' thing to do in CB's mind. But really, it would have been the easy thing to do, the thing that involved no sacrifice.

Leonidas could have gathered the Spartans together and drawn up a bunch of placards with bumpersticker slogans denouncing the imperialism of the Persians, and then taken the lot to the pass at Thermopylae where Xerxes would have rolled over them in a second with nothing but a chuckle at their naivete.

The hardest thing Leonidas could do was to refuse to compromise and, with the knowledge of certain death, fight for his women and children and possesions. Maybe it was a stupid thing to do, but it was the right thing to do. It is what a man would do.

Softness is taken as weakness by minds who never lost the knowledge of violence, and our current Islamic enemy knows all too well that violence pays. It's written right in the enemy's holy book. It's more clear to the enemy than it was to Hitler, because in this case they believe God stands behind them, and God is never wrong. God won't compromise, and God wants Sharia throughout the world. What is there to compromise about? How does one 'compromise' with an absolute? You either bend to it or you fight it uncompromisingly. It doesn't matter why the enemy thinks what the enemy thinks, or what the root causes are...sometimes it's really very simple: either you fight or you surrender.

Here's something I wrote a while ago that I think addresses CB's "complexity" meme:

Thursday, August 03, 2006

Alfred and the complexity of war

A fellow took me to task the other day for referring to "Europe" as if it is a monolithic entity. We were discussing Islamic ghettoization in Europe, and he made the point that the situation is far too complex to paint with a broad brush and that one must look at each country in Europe individually in order to discuss the subject. He is right of course, unless the point of the conversation is Islamic ghettoization in Europe.

It is true that parts of Europe are ghettoized and other parts are not. It is also true that Texas was not involved in the American revolution and that Saskatchewan was not involved in the war of 1812 (since neither existed at the time). Yet that does not make it untrue that the American revolution took place in America or that Canada was a protagonist in the War of 1812. Nor is it false or misleading to say that Europe faces Islamic ghettoization; the fact that parts of Europe are not yet ghettoized is hardly an assurance that they won't follow the parts that are if ethnic immigration floodgates are left open across Europe.

Heuristics, meaning in this case the use of shortcuts or rules of thumb, is a useful tool without which we would not be in a position to communicate anything to anyone. Taken to its logical conclusion, without the use of heuristics we would be reduced to a state of the egocentric particular and only be able to think, but not talk, about our individual selves. It is the very complexity of life which makes it necessary to reduce it to understandable categories.

I would dismiss this entire exercise as a latterday version of the debate on how many angels can dance on the head of a pin, except that the "complexity" critique is becoming an overused meme these days. It represents one of the more glaring flaws in modern academia: a tendency to inflate a subject with endless facets and in the process preclude any hope of arriving at a conclusion. Beyond that and far more annoying is the fact that neo-liberals seem to have fallen in love with "complexity".

What was spawned in academia has become in the hands of neo-liberalism a rhetorical tool; one with the twofold value of allowing the user to appear to seize the intellectual high ground and sidestep all arguments into the bargain. But how valid is it really?

Its fine to reject simplicity in favour of complexity, but somehow users of the complexity mechanism never seem to get around to talking about the myriad perspectives they have cleverly introduced to the subject. In fact, the implied suggestion is that the given subject is too complicated to deal with at all. Thus any argument this mechanism is used against has not been addressed...it has merely been devalued and sidestepped.

The rhetorical complexity meme is often used to devalue arguments for the use of force against Islam. Whenever someone calls for war against Syria, Iran, Hezbollah or Hamas, some pseudo-intellectual on the left is quick to leap up and assure us that the issue is far too complex to address through the use of brute force, and that the "warmonger" is brutish for even entertaining such simplistic thinking.

If pressed to expand upon this alleged complexity, the leftist looks stunned for a moment and then invariably trots out the usual mantras of "poverty", "ignorance" or "imperialism" as if nothing more need be said. If pressed harder, the leftist will retreat to the position that war ought to be a last resort; a tautology that has no end, since there will always be other resorts, including perpetual diplomacy, capitulation and abject rout. Ultimately the complexity argument usually means that the leftist has no real understanding of the issue, but knows that calling something "complex" elevates his non-understanding to an appearance of wisdom.

Alfred, King of Wessex, was both a scholar and a warrior. He could have taken the role of either when he faced the Danish Great Army at Edington in the year 878. He could have examined the enemy minutely, observing the myriad complexities of the opposing shieldwall and how this or that Dane or camp follower didn't really look like his heart was in it and that perhaps a bit of wergeld might calm their nerves. He could have reasoned that if his Saxons insisted upon attacking or even stubbornly standing their ground it would only make the Danes angrier and more alienated, and he would have been right. He might have reflected that Nordic Paganism was probably at its heart a religion of peace, despite its worship of warrior gods, violent battle death, and supernatural transport to Valhalla. He might even have deduced that it was only the Dane Guthrum and his henchmen who were the instigators, and that the great mass of Danes were moderates. Had he done all of the those things he might have been known to history as "Alfred the Clever".

Fortunately for the survival of Anglo-Saxon England, Alfred instead took the simplistic and artless route of seeing the Danish shieldwall for what it was: a horde of barbarians clamouring for blood, loot and rapine. And so he thrashed them and then he thrashed them again and after the slaughter he forced a truce on them, forcibly converting Guthrum to Christianity in the process. Then he built the borders of Wessex into a fortress and made a point of thrashing the Danes each time they encroached. For his brutish simplicity in time of need, and for laying the groundwork for a true and lasting peace with the Danelaw, Alfred is the only King in the long and illustrious history of Britain to be honored with the title "The Great".

Rarely in history have we seen anything so farcical as the situation we have now between the West and Islam. On one side the enemy beats its shields and howls for our heads, while on the other side we look for any possible excuse...not just to avoid war...but to avoid acknowledging that the enemy even exists.

I deeply sympathize with the idea that war ought to be a last resort. War is a horrible thing to behold, and the war that is coming will be nasty, brutish and long. But the barbarians are here whether we like it or not, and they want war, and there is nothing very complicated about that.

[M.Dancer]

Ill take the bait Canadian, A real man is a person who puts his family and friends before his own needs. A real man protects his family and the people he cares about at the risk of even his own life. A real man evaluates a situation and makes a judgment based on his best judgment. A real man can handle any situation that comes up in life and even if he cant he takes it on anyways. A real man takes responsibility for his own actions. A real man recognizes the need to protect his land from Domestic and Foreign attackers. A real man takes control of a situation through action and does not hide behind only words. To me, those are the signs and qualities that i feel a man should have.

So basically a real man is no different than a real woman....

[M.Dancer]

I think moderateamerican's defintion is about as good as it gets. Concepts like honor, duty and courage .....

Concepts like those have really nothing to do with gender. They are found through out the human race.

And without "U", there is no honour.

[ScottSA]

I think moderateamerican's defintion is about as good as it gets. Concepts like honor, duty and courage .....

Concepts like those have really nothing to do with gender. They are found through out the human race.

And without "U", there is no honour.

Concepts like those are at the heart of the gender divsion. Ask any feminist. CBs protests are intrinsically bound up in the feminist viewpoint. According to both postmodern and standpoint feminists, "male" concepts (duty, honor etc) are offshoots of rationality, which is seen as a male trait, while emotion, with its offshoots of empathy, compromise etc are seen as "female".

I don't have any particular argument with feminists on this point; my disagreement with them lies in the normative value attached to both. Thankfully the rest of humanity is beginning to rediscover male Virtu.

[M.Dancer]

I think moderateamerican's defintion is about as good as it gets. Concepts like honor, duty and courage .....

Concepts like those have really nothing to do with gender. They are found through out the human race.

And without "U", there is no honour.

Concepts like those are at the heart of the gender divsion. Ask any feminist. CBs protests are intrinsically bound up in the feminist viewpoint. According to both postmodern and standpoint feminists, "male" concepts (duty, honor etc) are offshoots of rationality, which is seen as a male trait, while emotion, with its offshoots of empathy, compromise etc are seen as "female".

I don't have any particular argument with feminists on this point; my disagreement with them lies in the normative value attached to both. Thankfully the rest of humanity is beginning to rediscover male Virtu.

Excuse me if I choose not to allow other gender politicals to define my world view. What is a CB protest?

Every female I have known and has been worth knowing has placed a high personal emphatithis on honour, duty and courage.

[ScottSA]

Excuse me if I choose not to allow other gender politicals to define my world view. What is a CB protest?

Every female I have known and has been worth knowing has placed a high personal emphatithis on honour, duty and courage.

And every women you have ever known who is worth knowing no doubt has a fairly traditional view of men, too. So called "sensitive men" are really feminized beta males, and although lionized by the feminist movement as arch ideals, they never really were very popular with women. Now the alpha-male is back as an ideal and it's really about time.

[M.Dancer]

No. I have known some high profile feminists whom I would include. I think of one woman in particular. Greta Nemiroff. I would say her life has been framed by integrity, courage and duty. She herself might choose different adjectives, but the definitions would be the same. And then there are others, no less feminists but more entrepreneurial rather than intellectual who embodied the same qualities and in doing so persevered.

[moderateamericain]

No. I have known some high profile feminists whom I would include. I think of one woman in particular. Greta Nemiroff. I would say her life has been framed by integrity, courage and duty. She herself might choose different adjectives, but the definitions would be the same. And then there are others, no less feminists but more entrepreneurial rather than intellectual who embodied the same qualities and in doing so persevered.

I knew someone would nit pick it but i had to at least attempt to answer a complex question in a paragraph which obviously could not be summed up on a forum. I knowingly entered into a fallacy of Complexity.

[Figleaf]

Alfred is the only King in the long and illustrious history of Britain to be honored with the title "The Great".

Unless you count Constantine. He started as a Briton.

[Canadian Blue]

What CB seems not to realize is that there's a time for softness, or 'compassion' as he calls it, and a time for strength, or 'violence' as he dismissively calls it. Sometimes softness doesn't work. I suppose the Spartans could have dressed as flower children and greeted the Persians, in which case Leonidas would have lived to a ripe old age in peaceful vassalage to Xerxes. That would have been the 'compassionate' thing to do, the 'mature' thing to do in CB's mind. But really, it would have been the easy thing to do, the thing that involved no sacrifice.

I wish life was like a movie too, my preference would be Road House.

Leonidas could have gathered the Spartans together and drawn up a bunch of placards with bumpersticker slogans denouncing the imperialism of the Persians, and then taken the lot to the pass at Thermopylae where Xerxes would have rolled over them in a second with nothing but a chuckle at their naivete.

Gandhi beat the British Empire, and he didn't use violence. Martin Luther King Jr. used non-violence and was able to defeat segregation.

The hardest thing Leonidas could do was to refuse to compromise and, with the knowledge of certain death, fight for his women and children and possesions. Maybe it was a stupid thing to do, but it was the right thing to do. It is what a man would do.

Many right wing extremists believe the same thing down in the US. Timothy McVeigh believed he was a patriot for doing what he did because the government was "tyrannical". Even though it looks great in a fictional movie, it's not the same thing in reality.

Softness is taken as weakness by minds who never lost the knowledge of violence, and our current Islamic enemy knows all too well that violence pays. It's written right in the enemy's holy book. It's more clear to the enemy than it was to Hitler, because in this case they believe God stands behind them, and God is never wrong. God won't compromise, and God wants Sharia throughout the world. What is there to compromise about? How does one 'compromise' with an absolute? You either bend to it or you fight it uncompromisingly. It doesn't matter why the enemy thinks what the enemy thinks, or what the root causes are...sometimes it's really very simple: either you fight or you surrender.

I saw some Muslim's in an Applebees tonight, needless to say I wasn't shaking in my boots. It's not surprising that in the wake of September 11th some people feel the need to direct their anger at a minority group.

Thanks for the xenophobic article as well, it really helped your case. Either way I know of a threat many people percieved to be real in the 20th century as well.

http://books.guardian.co.uk/review/story/0...,775668,00.html

http://www.adl.org/special_reports/protoco...ocols_intro.asp

[ScottSA]

Gandhi beat the British Empire, and he didn't use violence. Martin Luther King Jr. used non-violence and was able to defeat segregation.

This is the sort of nitpicking that so devalues you as a poster. So what if Gandhi used non-violence? Are you suggesting that Leonidas should have used non-violence? Was Chamberlain right? If Churchill had dropped spongebats on Germany and fired marshmallows at Heinkels, would that have helped Hitler see the light? Are you a complete idiot? The fact that you can point to one or two counterexamples is meaningless. So what? One reason Gandhi "triumphed" is that he was opposing a civilized occupier, and one loth to use force against native Indians by that time, but the real reason is that Britain couldn't afford to keep its colonies. Gandhi triumphed by default. How do you think Gandhizynski would have fared greeting German Panzers with a message of peace at the border of Poland in September 1939? What would Attla have done if he were suddenly faced by old Gandhi in his travels across Asia? How do you think Gandhiberg would have fared in the Warsaw Ghetto?

Timothy McVeigh? Just how much currency are you going to try to get out of that? You saw the list of Islamic atrocities for the last three months...take out Iraq and there are STILL hundreds, and all over the globe to boot, and you use McVeigh as a counterexample? I'm glad you didn't shake in your boots in Applebees. I'm glad that you can feel so smug about directing your anger at McVeigh instead of a "minority group" in the wake of 911. Very sophisticated indeed. Perhaps your smugness will give inspiration to the wahabbists in Saudi Arabia, and encourage them to allow minority groups into their country at all...

[Canadian Blue]

And every women you have ever known who is worth knowing no doubt has a fairly traditional view of men, too. So called "sensitive men" are really feminized beta males, and although lionized by the feminist movement as arch ideals, they never really were very popular with women. Now the alpha-male is back as an ideal and it's really about time.

So, there was a time when the brutish asshole wasn't the alpha male. I think all of those guys back at my high school are working for their dad's now.

Concepts like those are at the heart of the gender divsion. Ask any feminist. CBs protests are intrinsically bound up in the feminist viewpoint. According to both postmodern and standpoint feminists, "male" concepts (duty, honor etc) are offshoots of rationality, which is seen as a male trait, while emotion, with its offshoots of empathy, compromise etc are seen as "female".

There were females on many of my courses in the military, I didn't find them to be lesser than me.

Duty, honour, other cliches. Hold on, empathy and compromise are seen as female. Wow, next time I have a disagreement with some guy I'm gonna blow his f%$king head off!!!

I don't have any particular argument with feminists on this point; my disagreement with them lies in the normative value attached to both. Thankfully the rest of humanity is beginning to rediscover male Virtu

Which is?

[Canadian Blue]

This is the sort of nitpicking that so devalues you as a poster. So what if Gandhi used non-violence?

Because it proves that we can resolve our problems without this violence which you propose so often on here. Not everyone is as supportive of killing as you.

Are you suggesting that Leonidas should have used non-violence?

You know you're talking about a movie right?

Was Chamberlain right?

No, however if he had went to war with Germany earlier, would that have resulted in victory?

If Churchill had dropped spongebats on Germany and fired marshmallows at Heinkels, would that have helped Hitler see the light?

Don't let your emotions get a hold of you now. Perhaps if Chruchill had dropped bombs on military targets more often it would have helped his campaign. Once again, Bomber Harris campaign from 1942-1943 which was meant to break civilian morale was a failure. There was really no point to having massive bombing's in 1945 as Germany was pretty well defeated. The fact you seem to be supportive of the intentional killing of civilians shows where your moral values are.

Are you a complete idiot?

No, but you seem to call anyone who doesn't agree with you an idiot, so that would put me in with the people who have an inkling of rationality.

Once again, don't let your emotions take a hold of you because you feel the need to whimper during a debate.

The fact that you can point to one or two counterexamples is meaningless. So what? One reason Gandhi "triumphed" is that he was opposing a civilized occupier, and one loth to use force against native Indians by that time, but the real reason is that Britain couldn't afford to keep its colonies. Gandhi triumphed by default.

The British Empire persecuted Gandhi, get over yourself. Many were persecuted, and I believe blood was shed by many in India as well.

Are you honestly suggesting that without Gandhi, India would have gained independance in 1947.

How do you think Gandhizynski would have fared greeting German Panzers with a message of peace at the border of Poland in September 1939? What would Attla have done if he were suddenly faced by old Gandhi in his travels across Asia? How do you think Gandhiberg would have fared in the Warsaw Ghetto?

Gandhi would have died an honourable death. I think one who is willing to stand up for something, yet not be willing to take a human life is a perfect example of an indomitable ideal of moral courage. However, that is my own view. The Cathars used violence, however they still wound up being killed off. You on the other hand have taken the example of a

I'm not sure, from what I understand he was the inspiration behind a certain civil rights leader in the 1950's and 60's. But what kind of an idiot would not use violence in order to accomplish a goal.

Timothy McVeigh? Just how much currency are you going to try to get out of that?

Because before 9/11 the terrorist attack within US borders which saw the most death's was committed by an extreme right wing fanatic. My point being that people will use the same overused cliches here to somehow talk of how they are truly patriotic for committing an act of evil.

You saw the list of Islamic atrocities for the last three months...take out Iraq and there are STILL hundreds, and all over the globe to boot, and you use McVeigh as a counterexample?

Iraq, the American made clusterf$#k. I use McVeigh as a counterexample to show you that it isn't always a brown guy we should be worried about.

I'm glad you didn't shake in your boots in Applebees.

Well thank you. I'm not sure, I just don't see the Saracens coming in over the border and killing us all quite yet.

I'm glad that you can feel so smug about directing your anger at McVeigh instead of a "minority group" in the wake of 911.

Yeah, if I start to buy into these notion's that some on the extreme side of the right buy into it's going to result in a bad end.

http://www.displaysforschools.com/history.html

Very sophisticated indeed. Perhaps your smugness will give inspiration to the wahabbists in Saudi Arabia, and encourage them to allow minority groups into their country at all...

Saudi Arabia is a friend of the American's. Why are you so worried about Saudi Arabia?

Especially considering the involvement in Saudi Arabia of the Western World.

[jbg]

Gandhi beat the British Empire, and he didn't use violence. Martin Luther King Jr. used non-violence and was able to defeat segregation.

This is the sort of nitpicking that so devalues you as a poster. So what if Gandhi used non-violence? Are you suggesting that Leonidas should have used non-violence? Was Chamberlain right? If Churchill had dropped spongebats on Germany and fired marshmallows at Heinkels, would that have helped Hitler see the light? Are you a complete idiot?

Exactly. Ghandi and MLK tactics work well in nonviolent civil societies. In a place like Cuba, Nazi Germany, etc. you'd wind up, not a hero, but quite dead.

The UK, India's colonial master, and the US have little taste for violence, and an open, free press that reports it. Bull Connor looked mighty bad firehosing black (then called Negro) demonstrators.

[M.Dancer]

Gandhi beat the British Empire, and he didn't use violence. Martin Luther King Jr. used non-violence and was able to defeat segregation.

This is the sort of nitpicking that so devalues you as a poster. So what if Gandhi used non-violence? Are you suggesting that Leonidas should have used non-violence? Was Chamberlain right? If Churchill had dropped spongebats on Germany and fired marshmallows at Heinkels, would that have helped Hitler see the light? Are you a complete idiot?

Exactly. Ghandi and MLK tactics work well in nonviolent civil societies. In a place like Cuba, Nazi Germany, etc. you'd wind up, not a hero, but quite dead.

The UK, India's colonial master, and the US have little taste for violence, and an open, free press that reports it. Bull Connor looked mighty bad firehosing black (then called Negro) demonstrators.

Not to mention that Churchill had FDR hounding him to give india it's freedom. While Britain is sensitive to the opinions of the world community, Hitler wasn't, not was Xerxes.

[Figleaf]

Much of this discussion serves to illuminate an elementary flaw in the movie -- the Battle of Thermopylae is a story that deserves being told for its own sake, not stretched and bent into a metaphor for today.