Where I missed only one letter, you missed three. Either way, the Germans were quite sneaky, in Teutoburg forest for example. Or were those the Celts? =\
Also, look into the idea of “Socratic irony” and you might come to understand a little about the various means of higher-level discourse.
I don’t believe a player in a game is allowed to declare himself the victor, under most circumstances. Additionally, the small matter of you having found two tiny nit-picks upon my text, one of which is invalid and the other of which is the citation of a typo, while ignoring the body of my text concerning your actual argument hardly consitutes as game, set, or match, let alone all three. Your ability to refute any of the points concerning the actual argument, rather than try and make your word misuse seem les embarassing, perhaps, could achieve this. As it is, you’ve simply devolved (if such a thing was even possible from your former state) into the internet stereotype who is utterly unable to argue any of the actual points being debated, and therefore points out his opponent’s typos.
This is some surreal shit. I ironically nit-picked your original, paragraph-long nit-pick, hoping to teach you a lesson, and you try to turn it around on me as if I’m the nit-picker here. AND you pretend to ignore my statement that I’ll respond later, but then go on to nit-pick it afterwards. Truly, I must be in the presense of either a total novice or a master hand.
Yes, please do respond to my meaning; the essential point of me. Since I’m uncertain of the core meaning of a person, even myself, I’ll be quite intruiged to see your response to something which does not exist in such a manner as it may be defined.
A response to the meaning of my argument(s) might be more productive.
So, for every word you learn, do you just pick one of its many meanings and just go with it? Or…?
That’s it! I’ve finally diagnosed you. Poor child… absolutely no understanding of irony,
Yeah, how about just using the thread to wish Happy Thanksgiving to everybody else? Thanksgiving isn’t about celebrating past abuses, it’s about being grateful for what we have today.
Yes, but you ignore the fact that “conquest” is not one absolute concept and there are various massive differences between the sort of conquest GAP and I classify as more within the lines of “theft” than “conquest” and the sorts of conquest you name. Also the examples you give for who should have sorrow, by our logic, do not follow.
I haven’t seen any moping about. I have seen people saying that they think it’s ridiculous to celebrate a holiday supposedly created to give thanks to a people we have since murdered in droves. Which, honestly, is a pretty valid argument; it’s like the concept of an abusive husband giving his wife a present on her birthday, then going back to beating her the next day.
“Celts” aren’t an ethnic group. There were tribes who fit the definition of “celt” in Turkey. They are considered and defined as a celtic tribe. The Anglo-Saxons qualify on many levels, as well, to be considered celts, although not all of them, and due to their physical proximity to the majority of celtic tribes, it’s been argued that they’re a more unusual tribe. I don’t keep books on the celtic tribes handy on a whim, so I’ve got no sources to cite. Look on the internet, though.
Oh, and, explain to me the logic of “aliens built the pyramids” being on anywhere near the same level as “You could call the Anglo-Saxons members of an widely-defined and widespread group of tribes loosely tied together by trade and inter-tribal warfare if you were willing to generalize a bit.” Spare my the hyperbole. Although, I suppose if you ceased to overplay minour points of contension at the expense of ignoring my central point, it would be easy enough to note that you have not only no leg to stand on, but also no arms to catch you when you fall on your fucking ass. Can’t have people figuring that out, eh?
I did say they were germanic tribes. I was listing them as I listed Germanic tribes. What the fuck are you talking about? Can you even fucking read?
Oh, I see. You were unable to relate two seperate ideas without seeing them as the same idea. The bit about not holding any of those lands was seperate than the bit about what tiny chunks of land each Germanic tribe ended up with. They do not hold the vast majority of their empire any longer, with the Franks in France, Visigoths in Germany and several other countries, Ostrogoths in various nations as well.
You’re arguing that the actions we took were conquest, same as any of the people you cited. I’m pointing out an actual, relevant comparison would be an arguably less effective Adolph Hitler.
They were more united, yes, but they were still a widely fractured people, with Sunni and Shi’a fighting. Then, within a few decades of Muhammad’s death, a new, extremely conservative sect developed that attacked the two primary sects. Before Africa or Asia were conquered, the Suffi mystics emerged, as well. That’s just religious devisions. Political divisions were massive within a couple years of Muhammad’s death. Their increased unity then in comparison to now actually compounds the problem; it’s difficult to “mope about” over what your past leaders did when it’s difficult to even be sure if they were your leaders.
I’ll retreat to an utterance of Sabutai Ba’atuur (general of Genghis Kahn): “Haughty men of Persia, who of you may outride me, outshoot me?” To him, reading was not an essential part of culture; horseback-riding, Boke wrestling, and archery were the “arts,” not poetry and painting. You may look at this as less cultured than our definition of art, but you will note that such a statement is not one of fact. It is an expression of your opinion. There is no single, defined “culture” in all of the world. In America, it is considered polite to move your spoon in a certai nway through soup and absolutely not to slurp. In Japanese culture, slurping is the polite thing to do with soup because it shows you enjoy it. Culture is not a single thing, the same worldwide. Individual people, even, have culture. In my culture, Shakespeare stole a whole lot of stories and told them slightly prettier than they were told before. In yours, he’s the greatest literary figure in history (I think you said that, I may be wrong). Neither of us is “right” and neither of us is “wrong.”
I said this exact thing above. We’re the best at killing people. Europeans always have been. Our culture is rarely willingly adopted so much as it is forced; melting down katana into silverware, for instance, to be used by the Japanese in the wake of World War II. Gee, wonder where they got that American culture from? Although, admitedly, total disillusionment with their government and all figures of authority probably helped them to abandon their old culture.
Having the most money does not make you the “best” culture. They don’t dress and speak that way because English is superior, they dress that way to make a buck. English businessmen speak Chinese, Indian, or Japenese because those are people from whom we make money. When you trade with someone, speaking their language helps. This leads to odd cultural events like the American speaking Japanese while the Japanese man speaks English, to show the other they have learned their tongue. I can tell you from trips to both China and Japan, a good majority of them do not learn fluent English, some not even English at all. Some people in America do not bother to learn English. The majority, yes, but it’s not quite so universal as you insinuate, even in a country with English as its national language.
A valid point, but there are plenty of world regions where that does not happen, either. I’m not saying our culture is bad or evil, I’m just saying that marking it as the best is inane. As is marking any culture as such.
Oh, dear lord. So much bad logic in one paragraph. Okay, so, Europeans came from technologically behind to ahead, but such events could never transpire again? European culture won’t follow the same trend as other world-wide cultures and fall apart once a few of its most powerful centres do? Smaller national culture atrophy before larger ones? Holy shit, man. You’re completely deluded. You honestly have no concept of the way things work in a real world. I guess you really meant it when you said you held reason in derision. I’m not being facetious or mean. I honestly don’t think you get it.
The first definition of “make” to apply to your supposed meaning is the eighth. Between colloqueal usage and the actual definitions, your meaning would be damn near the bottom of most people’s interpretation. Given your frequent technically-inaccurate “figurative speech,” why would one not assume you were taking the common meaning of “force?”
I’ll give you a hint; it was illogical to take away any other meaning.
Ha, I suppose they were sneaky. Like I said, though, if it was to illustrate that I was being an asshole over a typo, that’s fair and I accept the counter-argument. If it was attempting to show that a typo was the same as misusing a word, then that does not follow and I refuse to accept such a counter-argument.
I’m well aware of the concept. I’m also well aware that it’s childish and ineffectual as an argumentative method, hence its primary use as a teaching method. Toher than the rhetorical questiong vaguely classifiable as Socratic Irony, is isn’t used as an argumentative method very often. Because peopel arguing tend not to wish to look ignorant. Although, I suppose you can’t help it, so you might as well make it look like you’re trying to, aye?
I nit-picked and replied to the actual substance of your post. Additionally, the fact that you were bitching non-stop about literary culture and what-have-you made it impossible for me to resist pointing out that you misused a word.
I actually did ignore your statement; I generally quote your post and respond bit-by-bit, not read the whole thing then respond. Saves time I do not wish to waste on listening to you, essentially. The second nit-picking was more in jest than as a serious argument against you. Also, since you attmpted to take the proverbial piss out of me over a missing word, I pointed out that you leave some out, as well. Everyone makes typos. Not everyone misuses sulk and skulk. Which is a stranger typo than forgetting you hadn’t included a word, I might add, since hitting a “k” is unlikely when going for a “u.”
No, and I also have no idea what word you’re referring to. Or did you just throw that in out of nowhere as a question.
I have quite a fluent understanding of irony. That doesn’t mean I don’t believe the use of Socratic Irony as an argumentative method to be inane and generally a mask to hide one’s real irony behind that oh-so-infantile curtain of “I meant to do it.”
I also object to the psuedo-irony many include within irony itself.
EDIT: Fuck it, I’m tired of this bullshit. No responses in this thread will be forthcoming, I’m not even going check for you answer.
Awesome! I created a thread that resulted in an intellectual barbeque. I’ll probably respond to this later, but we just came back from a very long road trip.
I imagine the people that are so upset over the plight of the American Indian and the sins of the grandfather should give their property back. It’s a rather hollow show of grievance to complain about the white man taking the Injuns’ land while still keeping it for yourself. I mean, I feel no remorse; I’m keeping my land. If you think it was such a great crime that deserves mea culpas to this day, maybe you should give your land back. It strikes me as hypocritical not to.
And Arac, don’t you dare tell anyone to get off the internet here again. Combination of Rules 13 and 16, etc, etc.
Please explain my violation of either of those rules; I did not attempt to enforce any rules (hence vigilantism) only made a suggestion that he be removed from my internet, the internet that I own (which most certainly exists because there are several internets, each owned by a single human being); the sole aim was not insulting him, I was arguing with his point and insulted him in the process several times, but administrators combine these two frequently with no such repercussions.
Additionally, my joking remark telling Sil to get off the internet (the internet which I own) violates a rule against trolling (despite more abusive argumentative posts having passed without a warning) or a rule against vigilantism (which I do not even comprehend the relation of to my post), yet his statement that European Culture is inherently superior to all others does not violate rule eight? I honestly don’t understand. Am I interpreting the rules incorrectly?
When you do own property, be sure to give it back to those tribes which lived in the region you bought it in. You know, for the tribe as a whole to own.
Mods in the past have interpretted telling someone to get off the internet/board/etc as vigilanteism because you’re giving orders to another poster despite being in no position to do so. It’s trolling because the comment offers nothing constructive; ordering someone to get off the internet does nothing but incite trouble. Also, there’s no way for one to know that comment was meant to be joking (and just meaning to be joking does not excuse one from the rules), especially when you call someone a fucking idiot after going on a diatribe against said person. If you don’t like his comments, ignore him. That’s what you do.
As for why Sil didn’t violate rule 8, that rule has been applied in thepast to typically only apply when one poster is insulting another on the basis of religion, nationality, etc. Had he known you were on the tribal registry and called you a scalper, it would be against the rules. Had he gone so far to not just say one culture is superior to the other but that the inferior culture was nothing but a bunch of glorified monkeys with tools, it would be against the rules. While what he said may be closed-minded (I don’t care enough about the subject to make any claim one way or another), his comments are on the fine line of not quite being against the rules.
I got told to call Arac stupid and I was gonna do this in a somewhat intellectual manner but jesus christ you people write too much crap Arac you’re stupid.
'Cos I saw that GAP had posted and wanted to see what he said, since I enjoy reading his posts. Then I read the 984’s post in the process of seeing GAP’s.
Also, I was pretty much just irritated with what I saw (and still see) as the sheer inanity of Sil’s post enough that I decided to ignore the thread. Then I realized I could accomplish something similar by just not reading whatever he responded.
You see, when I assert that European culture is superior to all others, I am expressing an “opinion”, though that word has too many negative connotations with it. Every 10 year old knows that about opinions and how they’re “never right,” but if no one ever stuck to these opinions or argued about them (“argue”, another word with too many negative connotations) we’d all die of either solipcism and isolation or degeneration in our habits. There very well may be books better than Shakespeare and James Joyce or buildings more beautiful than the cathedral of Amiens or paintings more beautiful than Botticelli or Velazquez. But I was born as in America to European ancestors, and it’s a completely healthy mentality to support one’s family, if you will, against others. The struggle of egos, of entire large geographic regions in this case, is repeated microcosm and macrocosm through every sphere of identity, from the individual artist (or warlord or business executive or…) against his precursors and contemporaries to the hypothetical intergalatic space invasion. And the struggle of egos gives birth to better things, or at least to you. My argument itself is European in this regard. Europe, the most antithetical of societies, proves itself by negating dialectics.
