[Yaponvezos]

Masschine made quite the interesting point about today’s media I believe. I don’t know about the rest of the world but as far as my country goes, less and less journalist actually care about journalism. The field is a mess and I truly have to go through to much myself just to get informed in what I see as a moderately safe way. It’s my personal habit to cross check everything and I get furious, more often than not, for the way media around the world treat viewers, listeners, readers and what have you. As it seems then, this might be a more universal problem than I initially thought. It’s somewhat funny in a sadistic kind of way too. I got to learn in the 11th grade that it’s one’s responsibility to keep his view of things separate from the facts. Of course one can comment and express any opinion that he may have, as long as he has made sure first that the public has been presented the cold sterile fact.

And since cpbell0033944 brought the “freedom fries” thing up, I think it would be interesting to tell you how some people reacted to that. At first quite some thought it was quite ridiculous and funny as an idea. But going over that some got to see more to it (whether that’s false or correct is an issue of course). By the way some (emphasis on “some”) Americans seem to use or refer to the word “freedom” and everything it means a bit arrogantly, in a sense that only America knows what it is and how it can be obtained. If that’s truly the way some thing of freedom, I can only find it to be sad and insulting to every civilization that ever existed.

FrankiesUncle, I absolutely understand. It’s impossible for us to not be occupied with your government’s decision as they influence a good part of the world, due to your country’s potition of power in a whole lot of fields. I don’t automatically resent the fact that you are in such a position. Even if you weren’t someone else would be in your shoes, so to speak. We, Greeks, have been monumentally stupid in several cases throughout our history in various cases, harming ourselves and sometimes many more.

And if most of you work such long hours, I agree that, in your little free time, you will avoid getting into such topics. I ‘ve felt the same. I’m a freelancer and don’t have the luxury of working certain hours day in day out. I’ve even kept typing 18 hours straight and after that I wasn’t able to understand a single word from anyone.

You have to realize thought, I don’t hold a grudge to the average American citixen. After all he has the right to lead a life the way he wants. I ‘m not even bothered by the ones that have no idea about on thing or the other. What always gets me thought is people not knowing a damn thing, either acting like they do or acting like, if they don’t, I must not either. That logical flaw has nothing to do with Americans. It has everything to do with humans and education. So in the end I feel we ‘re dealing with matters of universal magnitude and of perception.

I personally oppose anyone that is quick to insult random citizens. What are the chances that most ordinary people are actually in on government decisions?

I’d like to ask something else as well. There is the feeling in our part of the world that since the various terrorist attacks, the average American’s sense of safety has diminished hence the overly defensive attitude of some. Is this true or are we talking about a false impression?

And if it is true, how do you feel about it exactly? I mean where I live trespassing Turkish fighter jets are part of hour defensive routine. And since I want to be fair, it’s not that we ‘re not doing the same to them. It’s more like a peaceful cockfight. Sometimes it gets more than that but most of the time it doesn’t. What I try to say is that we are actually used to it to some degree, meaning that we don’t wonder if it’ll happen, we know it will. Therefore we’re not feeling insecure. Where we really feel insecure is in the diplomatic field since there is lot of interest in the region for various reasons and, when coupled with the occasional diplomatic gaffe from our part, it’s easier then we’d like to suffer great economical and strategic consequences.
I’m not sure every European feels the same as he happen to be at the edge of Europe, politically, economically AND geographically. Plus we ‘ve had Muslim neighbours and/or partners for centuries and we know what to expect.

It so annoys me that my english is not good enough to get the Churchill joke…

[Yaponvezos]

ROFL! This is hilarious! Good to get a break from all the serious talk in this thread.

[Yaponvezos]

I don't remember bumping into a site specifically catering to girl/girl FMG content. I'm not into that kind of thing but I believe it could be interesting and someont should make it happen, as long as the economics make sense of course.

LHart.com is a site offering mostly illustrated stories (or is "comics" the appropriate word?) and from my experience, that content seems to have been designed with men in mind. I remember there are some stories of girls fighting and there might be the occasional girl/girl action but, if I'm not wrong it's more like that: occasional.

[Yaponvezos]

Since Islam is not a person or an entity you have no obligation to it? So I take it democracy is a person and/or entity and you have an obligation to it? Civilization and culture is not a person either, let alone an entity. Let's not give a damn then.

I'm not saying what's wrong and what's not about Sharia. I'm saying it's a country's people's decision, not yours. If they plead for help, then help. If they don't, you just have no right to force your help upon them. Chances are you will just piss them off further and before you know it the whole thing escalates.

Evil is just what human flaws lead to, it's not a driving force. Hitler sincerely thought he was on a quest to heal humanity. What he did was wrong and nuts. But he meant well. The problem was his mind, through his personal pathos, distorted that initial innocent thought and messed everyone up. Well everyone except the german economy. He actually saved it.

[Yaponvezos]

The licensing thing is definitely annoying but what gets me even more, is that they 're asking too much money for that picture quality. It's really awful and there is no reason to keep the bitrate at 1 megabit. It's not even streaming content! And one more thing I 'm not sure whose fault it is but when I download speeds are sloooooooooooooooooooooow.

[Yaponvezos]

Well I have to disagree with you on this one. Fairness and leniency are two different things. Everyone deserves the former, only some deserve the latter.

And according to that wiki entry, you 're opposing the right of some or all muslim citizens to choose the way they want to be organized and develop their laws as they see fit? Why would you do that? Internal workings of a country are none of your business as long as they don't harm you. And please don't say that they do harm you as there is no way on earth to prove that law you, as well as everyone else outside a particular country, don't have to abide to actually hurts you.

Extremism, irrationality, distortion of simple facts, lack of proper education, personal problems and bias are the enemies of humanity through the ages. It's as simple as that.

[Yaponvezos]

Then the use of the word "Islamist" is wrong as well as it's just a synonym to "Muslim". "Jihadist", "Jihadi" and "Radical Muslim" are more like it.

No matter how a word might be used in one part of the world or another, the meaning of a word, in its literal form, should be clear and used accordingly. Above all else it's just a matter or respecting any language of the world.

[Yaponvezos]

Just a word of caution as I see it being written all the time. Please avoid such generalizations about Muslims. We 're talking about particular Muslims that happen to be extremists. There 's no need to put everyone in the same pot.

[Yaponvezos]

Then welcome aboard ProfUltima! One more of us!

[Yaponvezos]

Nice to get some perspective.

About us forgetting the US don't have a lengthy history, I believe you 're right, in a way. It's not exactly that we don't keep that in mind. We do and, to be honest, this seems to us like a source of ridicule. It's not the depth of your history and it has nothing to do with inferiority and superiority. But, I tell you, I could not wrap my head around the things I hear when you refer, for example, to feudal Japan as ancient Japan. What is ancient and what is not is something dictated by the scientific rules of history and we just don't understand how can anyone not get that. But I'm wandering off again.

In your arguments defense, in the middle of a conversation or a heated argument, judging from myself, I think you 're right that we don't take into account the depth of your history. We should as that is a defining factor for any country. Maybe we fail to do that because of being used to dealing with our neighbouring countries, with the mightier of which we actually go back quite some time.

You 're also right that there are bound to be great regional differences within a country. We get this in Greece as well and the whole country is smaller than a state of yours. It's similar to any country though. So we get as far as this in our logic. But we clearly have no idea what these regional differences are in your case. I know have no idea and I have yet to meet someone around here that has.

So could you provide some examples? And is there a source you'd recommend for to read on the matter, covering most if not all states and their differences?

Going on, I truly could never imagine that your average citizens don't really care about foreign policy. Having been raised the way I have, that seems unthinkable to me for various reason, not the least of which is being at odds (politically mainly) with Turkey for, well, centuries. I don't really know if interest in foreign policy should be demanded today but I get the feeling it should be more and more in the spotlight in the days of a significantly more global economy.

And on to the next point. So it's perceived that international bodies and foreign countries don't have your interests at heart? This is on tough cookie. First of all, ridiculous to expect something like that. In any place with two or more voices a disagreement at some point is a certain possibility.

As with any disagreement if all parties mean well, they will eventually get out of it. Regrettably most of the time the two or more sides don't mean well, mainly because they don't want to realize what their place is and get greedy or end up with an overly inflated ego. So I guess that justifies some of your stances. But this has to change eventually, for you and everyone else as a matter of fact. Especially in dealings that are just a matter of logic and someone always shows up to mess them up, no matter who that is.

And by the way, since when being "good" shields anyone from anything? I really wish it worked that way.

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