Utter, utter, utter cunts.

[colubridae]

Col - by your logic I can kill any number of people as long as my objective was other than to kill them, I might know I will kill them, I might decide my objective is worth their deaths, I might show little attempt to treat the wounded or avoid the young, - none of that matters as long as the primary objective was not to kill the civilian. But then, surely, deep down even you realise however warped (and it is) the hanging of a boy might be - it is still NOT the primary objective to kill the child, the objective is to scare the onlookers shitlessly into submission. The words 'Shock and Awe' come to mind....

The idea was relative culpability.

Nobody is saying that collateral casualties and deaths are "good" and that one can indiscriminately kill as long as one can colorably claim that one's objective is elsewhere. What I'm claiming, and what I think Col is claiming, is that it is bad to kill accidentally, and it is bad to kill unintentionally but due to one's intentional actions directed elsewhere, but it is far worse to string a 7 year old up premeditatedly and deliberately and hang him.

Yes that's exactly my point. I'm not very good at explaining it in words. sorry


I also think that sandinista is at best naively compartmentalising (leaping up and down at collateral damage, whilst blithely ignoring thousands of times more deaths on the roads – as if to say ‘I’m deeply concerned about X number of war deaths because they are war deaths, but I won’t concern myself about 1000X road deaths, simply because they were ‘accidents’*) It was sandinista who said 'It doesn't matter a whiff to the children… they are just as dead'!

Or at worst he/she is demonstrating political hypocrisy.
He/she is not angry because they are children dieing. It’s because they are ‘children dieing in war’ and that is a political point of view, not a humanitarian one.


‘accidents’ would not be my best choice of wording – carelessness is more appropriate. They are easily avoidable deaths. They are not a ‘price that must be paid for motor transport’ and there are tens of thousands more than war deaths!

Sorry but you got me on one of my pet hates.

[floppit]

Col - by your logic I can kill any number of people as long as my objective was other than to kill them, I might know I will kill them, I might decide my objective is worth their deaths, I might show little attempt to treat the wounded or avoid the young, - none of that matters as long as the primary objective was not to kill the civilian. But then, surely, deep down even you realise however warped (and it is) the hanging of a boy might be - it is still NOT the primary objective to kill the child, the objective is to scare the onlookers shitlessly into submission. The words 'Shock and Awe' come to mind....

The idea was relative culpability.

Nobody is saying that collateral casualties and deaths are "good" and that one can indiscriminately kill as long as one can colorably claim that one's objective is elsewhere. What I'm claiming, and what I think Col is claiming, is that it is bad to kill accidentally, and it is bad to kill unintentionally but due to one's intentional actions directed elsewhere, but it is far worse to string a 7 year old up premeditatedly and deliberately and hang him.

That is well put but I still think we are at a point where it would be better to agree to differ. I'm afraid I have less faith in 'our side' at war and I do strongly suspect that civilians lives are taken, not by accident, but as a means to an end wherever that is seen fit. Where one side has the fire power and means to make the killing less personal and the other less so there will be a difference in method - but to shock and awe inspire with a single child death IS no worse in my eyes than to do so through multiple deaths at a distance, knowing full well children will be among the number.

I genuinely feel the best hope of reducing the number of children harmed by wars is either peace (we can all wish!) or the realisation that we have to clean our own act up first rather than using incidents from the 'other' to justify more harm. The fundamentally religious are the least able to take or understand this but that cannot excuse us on the basis that the 'other' has not acknowledged what they do is wrong.

The alternative, to demonise them, has the potential to add to the justification for not just their deaths but a considerable number of their children killed by accident in order to achieve their deaths.

[sandinista]

Col - by your logic I can kill any number of people as long as my objective was other than to kill them, I might know I will kill them, I might decide my objective is worth their deaths, I might show little attempt to treat the wounded or avoid the young, - none of that matters as long as the primary objective was not to kill the civilian. But then, surely, deep down even you realise however warped (and it is) the hanging of a boy might be - it is still NOT the primary objective to kill the child, the objective is to scare the onlookers shitlessly into submission. The words 'Shock and Awe' come to mind....

The idea was relative culpability.

Nobody is saying that collateral casualties and deaths are "good" and that one can indiscriminately kill as long as one can colorably claim that one's objective is elsewhere. What I'm claiming, and what I think Col is claiming, is that it is bad to kill accidentally, and it is bad to kill unintentionally but due to one's intentional actions directed elsewhere, but it is far worse to string a 7 year old up premeditatedly and deliberately and hang him.

Yes that's exactly my point. I'm not very good at explaining it in words. sorry


I also think that sandinista is at best naively compartmentalising (leaping up and down at collateral damage, whilst blithely ignoring thousands of times more deaths on the roads – as if to say ‘I’m deeply concerned about X number of war deaths because they are war deaths, but I won’t concern myself about 1000X road deaths, simply because they were ‘accidents’*) It was sandinista who said 'It doesn't matter a whiff to the children… they are just as dead'!

Or at worst he/she is demonstrating political hypocrisy.
He/she is not angry because they are children dieing. It’s because they are ‘children dieing in war’ and that is a political point of view, not a humanitarian one.


‘accidents’ would not be my best choice of wording – carelessness is more appropriate. They are easily avoidable deaths. They are not a ‘price that must be paid for motor transport’ and there are tens of thousands more than war deaths!

Sorry but you got me on one of my pet hates.

again, on with the road accidents. I guess I'll explain this one more time. People DO NOT drives cars with the intention of killing people. People DO drop bombs with the intention of killing people. As for "politically motivated", Everything is politically motivated. In a war of choice (read...non-defensive/invasion/occupation, there are no "accidental" deaths. None. I would love to hear you say to a parent who had their kids blown apart by US bombs that "hey, don't worry about it, more people die in car accidents." Fucking hell.

[colubridae]

Floppit and especially Sandinista

I ran though some wiki stats on road deaths. This is distilled from WHO data for 2000

World wide per 100,000 head of population yearly road deaths – 3452
World pop 6,000,000,000

Worldwide yearly road deaths (extrap) – 20 million
Per day 500,000

Assuming half those killed are children 250,000 per day.
Assuming 10% are children 50,000 per day.

These deaths are horrifying violent trauma just as described by Sandinista, for collateral damage.
They are just as avoidable as collateral deaths.

It’s your quote:- “it matters not a whiff to the chidren…”

Where is your humanitarian outrage?
Where is your moral outrage?

Since Sandinista first posted, by a lenient count, 150,000 children have been killed on the roads.

Your posting indicates that you have no concern for road deaths, only for collateral damage deaths. And you are using this for your own political agenda. I find that despicable.

I would love to hear you say to a parent who had their kids blown apart by US bombs that "hey, don't worry about it, more people die in car accidents."

This is a particularly loathsome and disgusting thing say. And I would equally throw it back in your face.
Go tell a grieving parent who lost their child in a road death “Hey it doesn’t matter your child died in violent road death. My political agenda decrees that childrens’ deaths are only important in collateral war damage. You may find me despicable, but I don’t care I’ve got a flag to wave”



This is page source for my distillation
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_co ... death_rate

[sandinista]

By the same reasoning, I suppose I should be asking for the poster to refer to drivers as Utter, utter, utter cunts.

[colubridae]

By the same reasoning, I suppose I should be asking for the poster to refer to drivers as Utter, utter, utter cunts.

However 'righteous' your cause, making political hay out of violent chidrens' deaths is despicable,

[colubridae]

Sandinista and Floppit

I let my feelings get the better of me. I aplogise unreservedly.

[Coito ergo sum]

By the same reasoning, I suppose I should be asking for the poster to refer to drivers as Utter, utter, utter cunts.

I think it was you who were making moral equivalencies, wasn't it?

Once again, the idea is that whether an act is worse than another can depend on the intent or mens rea of the person committing the act. If a person cleans his gun while drunk, and it goes off, killing someone else, would that be "as culpable" as, say, that same guy, desiring that all homosexuals should die, lies in wait outside a gay man's house, and premeditatedly and deliberately confronts him, and executes him mob-style in front of his house?

The point is that some things are worse than others, and unintended civilian casualties in a war are not as evil as someone, with premeditation and deliberation, intending to do it, puts a rope around a 7 year old boy's neck and hangs him. It's a question of the mens rea there.

The boy is equally dead in either circumstance, and all, but so are victims in any homicide, and yet some homicides are justifiable, some are excused, some are first degree (premeditated and deliberate), some are second degree (intentional, but not premeditated), manslaughter (arising from reasonable provocation or in the heat of the moment, or recklessness), criminally negligent homicide (arising from criminal negligence), or accidental (not criminal). Either way, the dead guy is just as dead, but the act is more or less evil depending on the circumstances.

[sandinista]

The point is that some things are worse than others, and unintended civilian casualties in a war are not as evil as someone, with premeditation and deliberation, intending to do it, puts a rope around a 7 year old boy's neck and hangs him. It's a question of the mens rea there.

There are no "unintended" casualties in a war of choice (ie. an unprovoked invasion/occupation). When you drop bombs on people, people die. Nothing unintended about it. It is premeditated, planned and carried out. Unlike driving a car

[floppit]

I think there's a time to step back and let readers decide. For my part this is it.

[Coito ergo sum]

The point is that some things are worse than others, and unintended civilian casualties in a war are not as evil as someone, with premeditation and deliberation, intending to do it, puts a rope around a 7 year old boy's neck and hangs him. It's a question of the mens rea there.

There are no "unintended" casualties in a war of choice (ie. an unprovoked invasion/occupation). When you drop bombs on people, people die. Nothing unintended about it. It is premeditated, planned and carried out. Unlike driving a car

That doesn't mean it's as evil as taking 7 year old and hanging them purposefully, premeditatedly, and as a matter of express state policy, in order a take revenge on other people.

[sandinista]

The point is that some things are worse than others, and unintended civilian casualties in a war are not as evil as someone, with premeditation and deliberation, intending to do it, puts a rope around a 7 year old boy's neck and hangs him. It's a question of the mens rea there.

There are no "unintended" casualties in a war of choice (ie. an unprovoked invasion/occupation). When you drop bombs on people, people die. Nothing unintended about it. It is premeditated, planned and carried out. Unlike driving a car

That doesn't mean it's as evil as taking 7 year old and hanging them purposefully, premeditatedly, and as a matter of express state policy, in order a take revenge on other people.

What? You don't think the bombing of Afghanistan wasn't premeditated and a matter of state policy in order to take revenge? Come on.

[colubridae]

The point is that some things are worse than others, and unintended civilian casualties in a war are not as evil as someone, with premeditation and deliberation, intending to do it, puts a rope around a 7 year old boy's neck and hangs him. It's a question of the mens rea there.

There are no "unintended" casualties in a war of choice (ie. an unprovoked invasion/occupation). When you drop bombs on people, people die. Nothing unintended about it. It is premeditated, planned and carried out. Unlike driving a car

That doesn't mean it's as evil as taking 7 year old and hanging them purposefully, premeditatedly, and as a matter of express state policy, in order a take revenge on other people.

What? You don't think the bombing of Afghanistan wasn't premeditated and a matter of state policy in order to take revenge? Come on.

Ok I did aplogise. I assumed you would let things be. But so be it.

Once again so that everyone understands you have a political agenda, and care not a jot for the killing of innocent children.

You have used these deaths to gain some moral high ground, yet you refuse to show greater concern for the greater evil.
Traffic deaths are killing, conservatively, 15,000 children per day. Where is your righteous indignation? Where is your moral outrage.
You are simply using collateral deaths to promote your own political agenda. This is despicable and shameful.

[Coito ergo sum]

The point is that some things are worse than others, and unintended civilian casualties in a war are not as evil as someone, with premeditation and deliberation, intending to do it, puts a rope around a 7 year old boy's neck and hangs him. It's a question of the mens rea there.

There are no "unintended" casualties in a war of choice (ie. an unprovoked invasion/occupation). When you drop bombs on people, people die. Nothing unintended about it. It is premeditated, planned and carried out. Unlike driving a car

That doesn't mean it's as evil as taking 7 year old and hanging them purposefully, premeditatedly, and as a matter of express state policy, in order a take revenge on other people.

What? You don't think the bombing of Afghanistan wasn't premeditated and a matter of state policy in order to take revenge? Come on.

I think Afghanistan was a legitimate exercise of force against Al Qaeta and the regime that was harboring them.

I think the bombing of Germany in 1945 was premeditated and a matter of state policy too, but I think it was legitimate.

And, yes, I think stringing up 7 year olds on purpose is worse than the civilian deaths as a result of those two legitimate exercises of force. The deaths of those civilians in the case of Afghanistan and Germany are on the heads of the Taliban and the Nazis.

So, you "come on."

[sandinista]

Coito ergo sum, well, there you have it. There was nothing legitimate about the invasion of Afghanistan. I guess thats the sticking point here, obviously. As for colubridae, everyone has a political agenda. Don't act all surprised about it, you do to. Again with the traffic