h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Dear Batty,

Sabra and Shatila, both refugee camps in Lebanon, massecare happend 19 yrs ago when the Israeli army invaded Lebanon. It was ordered by the current prime minister of Israel, Ariel Sharon. The massacre, which was just as ugly as the more recent one that was commited on th WTC, it claimed the lives of innocent people, this time they were Palestinine refugges who were first driven out of thier homes in what is now Israel, then attcked in their refugee camps. An Israeli writer claimed that about 4~5 thousand ppl have been killed in Sabra & Shatila and I am not even going to state what the Palestines calim.

The reason I asked about it was that few days ago marked the 19th year since it happend, and yes in Belguim the local police stopped those who tried to remmeber the ones lost in Sabra & Shatila. More importantly, can you pleaes tell me how can a guy, a murder and let me use a word that we hear now everyday a "Terrorist" become the leader of a country. The world does not seem to have problem with it, or they don't even know, or the way I see it simply those lives lost are really not worth as much as someone from the first world. Please tell me ANYONE, how can any sane person explain this one.

I strongly believe that IF humans are to live in peace together, then we should acknowldge the pains of ALL people, and not just feel the pains of the strong and wealthy and be careles about the opressed and the poor feels just because they live in what seems to be far away places. Great unjustices have been commited on many ppl from many third countries. Once people start feeling powerless, and unimportant and thier pains ignored, then I believe this is the PERFECT MIX for "Terrorists" to be created.
this part is to DrMo:
Islam is a peacful religion, and many religions and different ethnic groups have lived in the lands where it is popluar for many many years. Having said that, it definitly have been used, just like any religion, to achieve POLITICAL obejctives depending on interpetations and beliefs. But just like Christianity, which some may believe that it is a more forgivig Religion,although its followers believe in the old testment, there have been always some people who have used it to achieve thier own POLITICAL Agenda, for example the Crusades!

it is all about politics and uguly GREED, so please do not judge a whole religion by reading some parts of its holy book or by listining to a baised opinion. If we are serious about understanding any religion or any school of thought, then we MUST make more effort to come to a better understanding.

Batty, thank you for your honest reply. I totally sympethise with ALL of those who have lost ones in WTC, and with those of you in New York and the rest of the US who have felt terror in your own city/country.


Finally, I apologize for the long post.
Peace and Justice to ALL

184771 - thank you for your timely reminder about Sabra and Shatilia - you are right - it IS relevant to the WTC attack.

Mycroft - my point is that rhetoric like 'surgical strike' and 'rooting them out' sounds fine and dandy - bit it just does not take account of the reality of how terrorists operate. A "War On Terrorism" is as inoperable as a "War on Drugs" for the same operational reasons.

So while anyone - American or otherwise - can say 'what we should do is a clean surgical strike, go in, take 'em out, and leave' - there remains an educational process to go through. 'Cos that scenario ain't gonna happen because it can't be done.

All researchers using Numbers - please condsider choosing a name. It makes it much easier for the rest of us to keep track of who is saying what. As you can see the names here range from the given to the wildy surreal. The hyperlink w/ your chosen name updates automatically whenever you change your name.

a human being using her given name of Ben

184771 (Is there something else I can call you? Will you be activating your personal space?) - Thank you for your reply. I obviously know very little about the happenings in Sabra and Shatila. As I said, I was quite young at the time and admittedly involved in my own adolescent pursuits.

It's impossible to say rationally how a terrorist can become the leader of a country. It happened before and sadly may happen again. Not intending to sound flippant about it, it is a sad situation that I'm not knowledgeable enough about to answer intelligently.

DoctorMO - regarding your comment on Islam I agree with the other comments posted. Too many people have twisted the words in all of the various religious texts to their own needs to make any decision on a religion from "excerpts". I have friends who are followers of the religion who absolutely do not hold such beliefs. I also believe such blanket statements (beliefs) on a religion that one cannot possibly understand without years (indeed a lifetime) of study are part of what causes racial ignorance and hate.

well if any Muslim dosn't belive in these tyings then maby they should bring out a new Word of GOD book?

-- DoctorMO --

Just a response to Loony: where did you get that about Catholics banning condoms in Africa? Firstly, as far as I know Catholicism is not particularly prevalent on this continent. Secondly, nobody has money for condoms anyways. Thirdly, just about nobody knows that a condom can prevent AIDS anyways. Fourthly, some people here don't even believe that there is such a thing as AIDS. Fifthly, many people believe that HIV/AIDS can be cured by sexual intercourse with a virgin or a child. Sixthly, there are many 'healers' that say they can cure AIDS. Seventhly, there aren't any AIDS statistics so the people do not realise how bad the problem is. Eighthly, there's a stigma around AIDS so people who know they have it try to hide it. Ninthly, there are crime syndicates spreading around fake certificates stating that people are HIV free ... they sell them to people who know they are HIV positive. And so on and so on. Don't blame the Catholic Church.

DoctorMO,

Read any religious text, including the Old Testament, and you'll find things that can be used to justify hate. It's not just Muslims.

Yes but when the New Testement talks about Slavery there is always a small note to the efect that slaves should be set free were ever posable. not that I belive in Chritaity or whether this information has any relevence as I see what your trying to say and I agree.

-- DoctorMO --

DoctorMO,

My point was that most religions have portions of their texts that justified brutality. Such were the times they were written in. All have had problems with those who would use snippets of these texts to justify their actions. All of us, no matter what the religion, must discern what applies to us today. IMHO anyway.

Just to say that some of the nastiest flame-wars here on hootoo have been about religion, and it would be good if we can avoid one flaring up here.

I have not read any of the Koran, but I do know where to find bigotry in the Old and New Testaments.

Surely it is enough to note that there are fundamentalists to be found in Judaism, Christianity and Islam - and that there are also more liberal traditions in each of these religions too.

I would also note that orthordoxy and fundamentalism are not the same.

Personally I am glad that my spirituality of choice does not include a god.

calling myself
a buddhist called Ben

Buddhist called Ben - I bow to your Buddha nature and to your well-considered and depressing points about the brave new world.

You're right to point out that our recently won freedoms are under threat. But, in a perverse way, the very fact that there are so many people who are willing to challenge that threat gives me cause for hope. The diversity of those who are actively protesting various sinister agendas around the world has to inspire some optimism, doesn't it?

In the good news bad news department, I got an email from Amnesty International UK today (in response to a letter addressed to the beeb CC'd to AI) assuring me that AI is taking a keen interest in protecting Muslims and others against persecution resulting from the new CNN/Bush war against anyone not in possession of a white stetson. In the same batch I read a Reuters report about China asking that America change its mind about the limited moral support it affords the Tibetans and Uyghur people in exchange for its participation in the anti-terrorism super friends. It accused the Dalai Lama - the Nobel Peace laureate and beacon of moral authority - of masterminding bomb plots and assassinations. I don't know whether to laugh, cry, or be sick.

JTG

ps Note the regression from enlightened bliss to tears.

GTTD, the reference to the Catholic Churches stand against condoms comes from a piece I wrote for the h2g2 Post a few weeks ago. The Post is a weekly online newspaper associated with this site that is put together by a few Researchers (new contributers always welcome. Here is the piece in full

In a clash of moral values, the churches usually assume they hold the high moral ground.

However, when Catholic bishops in southern Africa last month (July) declared the use of condoms to prevent the spread of Aids to be 'immoral and misguided', they found themselves accused of being irresponsible and misguided. That must cut deep. One thing bishops pride themselves on is being responsible; and the guidance they lay claim to, being from God as they firmly believe, is second to none. Could they be wrong?

Yes, they could - and many Catholics, among others, think that in this decision, they were. The bishops could say they were merely being consistent with centuries of teaching about the natural law in general, and with Pope Paul VI's 1968 encyclical banning artificial contraception in particular. The problem is that those approaches are human and imperfect, notwithstanding the church's claim to speak with divine authority, and need always to be tested by their adequacy in specific situations, and by love.

The specific situation is that 70 per cent of about 34 million people worldwide who carry the HIV/Aids virus live in southern Africa, and 13 million of the 16 million who have died of Aids died there. In South Africa, up to five million people, or more than one in 10, carry the virus.

Love requires a compassionate response. The government's strategy is to promote the use of condoms to prevent infection, though they are not foolproof, on the basis that they will protect at least 85 per cent of users from the disease. The bishops counter that condoms encourage promiscuity and therefore increase the incidence of Aids. Human dignity is at issue, they say, so the truly compassionate response is for the church to promote abstinence from sex before marriage and faithfulness within it.

Obviously, no one is going to get into trouble by following those precepts. But they pose two problems. In the realities of southern Africa and elsewhere, moral messages, however high-minded, are not going to curb the Aids epidemic. Sex is so basic and powerful an instinct that there will be many people of all ages who find themselves carried away - or taken advantage of - outside marriage or steady relationships. Aware of that, it was Catholics closest to the Aids sufferers who sought a change in the church's stance. Bishop Kevin Dowling of Rustenburg, for example, argued that the church could approve condoms for 'preventing the transmission of death, and therefore not as a contraceptive to prevent the transmission of life'. The church newspaper Southern Cross endorsed this view, drawing a parallel with medication to regulate a woman's menstrual cycle, which the church allows even though it also makes her temporarily infertile.

Ironically, the bishops tacitly reflect this position when they say married couples may use condoms when one of them is HIV-positive, as long as they abstain while the woman is ovulating. In this way, there would be no artificial barrier to conception (which was the point of the papal encyclical). The bishops also say that prophylactics 'change the act of love into a selfish search for pleasure', as if pleasure somehow detracts from human dignity and responsibility. On the contrary, the pleasure of making love while preventing conception can be a way to express love and responsibility for each other - which is why millions of Catholics in committed relationships use contraceptives despite the church's condemnation.

That raises the second, and deeper, problem. Those couples are not rejecting morality, but asserting an alternative morality which seems to them more human, more loving and more Christian. No one should say they are being irresponsible.

The pope's 1968 encyclical probably did more to erode the church's moral authority than anything else the church has done in the past century. Catholics listened, and made up their own minds.

So with this statement. Its strict imposition would condemn millions to suffer and die needlessly. Quietly or stridently, many Catholics will dissociate themselves from it, and non-Catholics will reject it. One of these is Cape Town's Anglican Archbishop Njongonkulu Ndungane who says: 'This is a crisis and we can't pretend things are not happening. We advocate abstinence and faithfulness to partners, but we have 'to provide protection for those who cannot abstain.'

For the most vulnerable, which is the more Christ-like response?

The h2g2 Post can be found at http://www.bbc.co.uk/h2g2/guide/thepost

A new issue has just been posted (20/9/01)

But you see, Loony, it's not as if the Catholic Church actually has any power to prevent people from using condoms. They're just recommending abstinence instead, which is in fact more reliable than condoms, like you say. A 'success rate' of 85 percent means that after about seven 'acts of love' with someone who's HIV positive, you'll be likely to be infected with the virus. If you're not, you can count yourself lucky. There honestly is a risk that widespread condom distribution could encourage promiscuity ... the tack that the government is taking is to encourage chastity, but condom use if that is too difficult.

Abstinence is not at all impossible. It's made easier or more difficult depending on cultural factors, though. Some of the 'problematic' cultural factors include those I mentioned previously.

Also, it's not just the Catholic Church recommending total abstinence outside of marriage. Politicians do so as well. There has been a recent ban in Lesotho issued by the king. Unmarried young girls are now legally prohibited from having sexual intercourse for the next three years - if not they have to pay a quite heavy fine. I can get you the full report if you want.

The Catholic Church is quite small over here and have little influence over the general population.

The actual HIV infection rate is probably much higher than 1 in 10. It may be around 40% or even higher. My sister tells me that at the moment virtually *everybody* that they test is HIV positive in the hospital where she works - Baragwanath, on the 'Rand.

Not for the points made by John the Gurudener about Tibet ... obviously, war against China will not be an option; how should the world address that particular problem? That will *have to* be solved in a peaceful manner. It also *has to* be solved. The extermination of the Tibetans and/or their culture simply cannot be allowed.

We desperately do need to find ways for solving the world's problems without violence ... and I think for that we must start thinking more about the actual and also *potential* consequences of our policies and acts.

I agree that simply not beliving in GOD or at least in a very big man that looks down on everybody from a cloud with a thunder bolt in one hand a his white beard in another. is simply much better. I my self have a rather personal belife and might share at some later time, if demed apropate.

Damb I wish I could spell a bit better.

-- DoctorMO --

But what has this got to do with the Twin Towers terrorist attack? Or are you just using this forum as an excuse to have a go at the Catholic Church?

Jude
(and I'm not a Catholic so I'm not objecting on personal grounds)

DoctorMo, put your posts through a spell-checker first. Your email client will have one.

Moving right on.

Oh dear...

The initial code name for the Pentegon's response to last week's attacks on the United States, Operation Infinite Justice, will likely be changed to avoid offending Muslems, US defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld has said.

The issue arose at a briefing when a reporter told Rumsfeld that Islamic scholars had objected to the name on the grounds that only God can mete out infinite justice in their view.

The code name was given to reporters by defence officials yesterday.

Jude, to put the Catholic stuff in context, you will have to trawl through the backlog.

Dear Batty and Ben, both of you are most welcome (new identity *smiles*)

I believe that the reason many people in the west don't really know about it, especially younger ones (I was young too when it happened) is that the media does not remind us of such horrific acts, or if they did, they would be of some really minor effort. I have lived in the US for many years, and I don't even remember a single time when a major TV network ever mentioned anything about this massacer.And I did watch a lot of TV while I was there.
The only rational explanation I have for having a "terrorist", who have killed something around 4000~5000 civilian lives to become the leader of a democratic country is that this terrorist has a lot of power or powerful friends, so much power in fact that the great majority of people in the "developed world" don't even know much about this massacer and his role in it. So having said that, I have another question: Do you think we can call the people who elected him to become thier leader as terrorist supporters??
I agree to the fact that it has happened before, but from now on we, the peace-loving people of the world, especially the ones living in countries where their voices is heard more by their leaders, is NOT to let it happen again.


Peace and Justice to ALL

Well put, Me@SF (or would that be "the researcher formerly known as 184771"? ).

I guess the thought of considering the people who elected him as terrorist supporters would depend on many things I have no way of knowing.

Ideally we hope we can keep people who do horrible things from coming to power. If I were to think of a way to do it chances are it would be overly simplistic and not consider so many facets that I have been unaware of. I suppose all we can do is try to constantly learn about other cultures and goings on around the world. Even though our knowledge would still be limited it would at least be more than we had before. Which would in turn empower us more even if the only power is better understanding.

Okay. I'll stop rambling...

OK, I have nothing agains any religion it's the people who use it to justify killing and torture.

-- DoctorMO --