Re: The Bigger, Badder, Even More Serious Thread [5]

[azriel]

Agreed Petty but, I think for some individuals Religion does play a part, a fooking big part !

[Pettytyrant101]

{{{Love that bit of Alf- classic }}}

[azriel]

Yeah, he, the Alf character was so typical of his day. I remember hearing my family speak like him, mainly the men, uncles, grandad Warren Mitchell was obviously showing how brainwashed & stained people can be & how ideas stick & get bigger till it gets all out of hand.

[David H]

It's also clear from studies like this and previous ones that Neanderthals were not a separate species, but there's been a movement to classify them as a subspecies of Homo sapiens since at least when I was a kid, because I remember reading about it in textbooks in the early 2000s.

I first met the subspecies theory in an Anthro class in the late 70's and it wasn't new then. The first Neanderthal genome data seemed to show much more isolation than the archaeological evidence of overlapping populations seemed to suggest, so the pendulum swung back for a few years, but the newest genome date is more and more supporting the subspecies theory, and more interesting I think, is suggesting timelines and locations for when the various populations...um...overlapped. It's getting to the point where terms like Homo Sapiens Neanderthalensis and Homo Sapiens Sapiens are becoming obsolite (if they're not already. This is just a cranberry farmer's take on all this. )

To my memory though, most of the research about Neanderthal ancestry had been based in Europe though (isn't red hair supposed to be an originally Neanderthal trait?)

There's been research all over Eurasia , but I do seem to remember that some of the first Neanderthal genes identified in modern populations were in areas associated with hair, fueling the age-old racial speculations for a news cycle or two. Whether we like it or not, appearance is a part of our identity and so the visual markers are going to be discussed with each new find. Again, shrug .

[Mrs Figg]

the red hair/Neandertal thing would explain Glasgow on a Saturday night.

[Mrs Figg]

anyway the Tory party is tearing itself to bits. I loathe IDS but he has really done us all a huge favour.

[halfwise]

the red hair/Neandertal thing would explain Glasgow on a Saturday night.

[Mrs Figg]

they have bombed Brussels airport. 26 dead. this is scary.

http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2016/03/22/471391497/what-we-know-terrorist-bombing-at-brussels-airport

[azriel]

This is terrible

[bungobaggins]

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/28/world/europe/trump-finds-new-city-to-insult-brussels.html?_r=0

JAN. 27, 2016

...

Asked by the Fox Business Network anchor Maria Bartiromo about the feasibility of his proposal to bar foreign Muslims from entering the United States, Mr. Trump argued that Belgium and France had been blighted by the failure of Muslims in these countries to integrate.

“There is something going on, Maria,” he said. “Go to Brussels. Go to Paris. Go to different places. There is something going on and it’s not good, where they want Shariah law, where they want this, where they want things that — you know, there has to be some assimilation. There is no assimilation. There is something bad going on.”

Warming to his theme, he added that Brussels was in a particularly dire state. “You go to Brussels — I was in Brussels a long time ago, 20 years ago, so beautiful, everything is so beautiful — it’s like living in a hellhole right now,” Mr. Trump continued.

People can make sarcastic comments on twitter and disregard Trump's comments all they want because they think "he's racist" or "he's Hitler", but it sounds to me like they were ignoring reality. We can't let this happen to our EU allies, and we can't let it happen at home. We need strong leadership.

[bungobaggins]

https://mobile.twitter.com/RT_com/status/712180268472344576/video/1

[Mrs Figg]

I tend to agree with Trump on this. Its not racism its cultural. The Sharia law is incompatible with Western culture. Wherever Sharia law is practiced there are human rights problems. Why do you think millions of refugees don't flee to Saudi Arabia. SA is rich but people are beheaded on street corners for the slightest imagined insult to Islam.

[David H]

Sharia has been around for 1500 years, and most of that time it's been as tolerant and peaceful as any other culture/legal system. I don't think it has as any more shall be put to deaths in it than the Bible or the Talmud.

It's when any religious law is used by zealots as an excuse to ignore the rule of civil law that you have problems.

The backlash can often look like genocide. Think Inquisition vs. Heresy-flavour-of-the-day if we don't want to talk about more recent purges.

When I was a kid I was taught that this was why religious freedom was such a fundamental right in the USA, but I've since learned otherwise.

[Lancebloke]

Most of the holy books prescribe various forms on punishment for various different crimes, not just Sharia. I could only imagine what would be going down on street corners should some of the extreme evangelicals in the U.S. ever get power. Probably similar to what happened in Europe not that long ago.

Trump, in my opinion, would be a big step backwards in all sorts of things domestically and internationally. People say he is great because he says what is on his (and many people's) mind... but that isn't the way to get others to buy in to ideas and eventually embrace them. I can only see another era of division, war and the strengthening of some of the small pockets of extremist ideology through the next generation of evangelicals and muslims alike.

[David H]

People say he is great because he says what is on his (and many people's) mind... but that isn't the way to get others to buy in to ideas and eventually embrace them.

I tend to agree with you Lance. What's interesting though is that yesterday when Trump was addressing the American Israel lobby, he read from a teleprompter and stuck carefully to his script. I don't think we've ever seen that from him before.

He must be trying to dial the manic energy back now, trying to be more "Presidential" as people keep saying. It will be interesting to see if he can be scripted and still keep his populist appeal. And if scripted, what those scripts will say...

[Eldorion]

People can make sarcastic comments on twitter and disregard Trump's comments all they want because they think "he's racist" or "he's Hitler", but it sounds to me like they were ignoring reality. We can't let this happen to our EU allies, and we can't let it happen at home. We need strong leadership.

I think most people living in Brussels would take issue with Trump comparing their city to a hellhole.

But yes, people who have been paying attention are aware that Belgium has a serious problem with radicalization based on the number of jihadis they've produced relative to their overall population, and that the Molenbeek area is particularly bad.

[Lancebloke]

People say he is great because he says what is on his (and many people's) mind... but that isn't the way to get others to buy in to ideas and eventually embrace them.

I tend to agree with you Lance. What's interesting though is that yesterday when Trump was addressing the American Israel lobby, he read from a teleprompter and stuck carefully to his script. I don't think we've ever seen that from him before.

He must be trying to dial the manic energy back now, trying to be more "Presidential" as people keep saying. It will be interesting to see if he can be scripted and still keep his populist appeal. And if scripted, what those scripts will say...

People seem to buy in to his rhetoric... I imagine a 'dialling down' wouldn't be received too well by the supporters that won't be just voting republican because they couldn't bring themselves to vote any other way. I really hope his campaign falls apart some way along the line. Maybe he is trying to reenact brewsters millions and this is all a joke!

Eldo - Belgium does have a big problem with the way it has segregated it's society... as do a lot of European countries. There is no better breeding ground for extreme ideas than a large group of young, unemployed, poor people of similar backgrounds. Molenbeek is exactly that as are some of the districts of Paris and other big cities in Europe.

[halfwise]

Yep, the problem is segregation. I think because America tends to have a more mobile population, the enclaves are less pronounced, though still there of course. I have absolutely no statistics to back this up, but my sense is that American Muslims tend to be more integrated into society than European Muslims, though we may begin to backslide as hostility towards Muslims grows. The absolute worst thing we can do is increase hostility to Muslims.

[Eldorion]

Europe as a whole (well, the governments, anyway) seems to have taken the idea of "multiculturalism" meaning multiple different cultures existing in parallel and not really interacting all that much. Whereas America is more into the "melting pot" model. I know this is a huge generalization but that's the sense I get as an observer.

[Pettytyrant101]

{{{Twenty years ago when I was at school we studied the 'melting pot' theory in Modern Studies as a purely American concept. There were no European examples. The UK is a bit of an anomalous example though, its does a bit of both living alongside other cultures and melting pot, depending where you are. In the cities, especially in England but to a lesser extent in Scotland too you get enclaves of minorities, but as a lot of Scotland's population is rural in the country they tend to be more integrated just because its hard to stay anonymous in a small Scottish town or village (some folk mistake this trait and talk of how friendly Scots can be, we aren't, we are just really nosey bastards).
I think particularly with Muslims it all goes back to Queen Elizabeth I, as she was excommunicated she struck a bunch of trade deals with Muslim countries instead, bringing a lot of Muslims, usually of high prestige and wealth to the UK. And the view set up by Elizabeth on state and religion, and largely followed ever since, is that your religion, your culture and how you practise it is no business of the states. This means that if a group wants to keep to themselves, practice their own beliefs ect they have tended to be allowed to without too much state scrutiny.
If you remember in the wake of 9/11 there was a lot of finger pointing at the UK and London in particular and its seeming tolerance for 'Muslim radicals'- this was a deal between the UK police forces and secret services and the religous leaders of those communities which had been in place for a long time- 'we wont bother you if you promise not to shit on your own doorstep.'
That held till the London bombings- in the speech Blair gave in there wake he, in not very coded words, said 'the deal is off, you broke it, now we are coming after you all'.
The problem being of course that the other side already thought the deal had been broken, by Blair, when he invaded Iraq with Bush.
Since then the UK has largely floundered about on the issue of 'integration' versus the traditional belief of 'do what you like so long as it doesn't cause anyone else trouble'.}}}}

[Mrs Figg]

there are a lot of places in the world where large group of young, unemployed, poor people of similar backgrounds congregate. But they don't bomb airports. I always find Muslim condemnation of these atrocities lukewarm.

[halfwise]

Well, remember the American counterpart: do you ever hear Christians rushing to condemn the bombing of abortion clinics specifically as Christians? They see no need. Loonies are loonies. Don't ask Muslims to condemn loonies just because they're loonies of the same faith. Looks good from an outsider perspective, but it's totally uncalled for and unjustified.

[Lancebloke]

Figgy - yes you do. The problem inow the West is generally Muslim extremism because we are involved in their politics directly... we have started or been involved in countless wars with them in the last 15 years.

In Turkey you have the kurdish (PKK etc) who bomb turkey because that is who they are involved with. I am sure they would like to have a go at Russia too if they could muster up the logistics.

In the East you have Uighers (admittedly muslims but of a different sort).

In South America you have the various gangs that target things more domestically or get in to civil wars like in Colombia.

So yes, it does happen and yes, it is considered comparable because in all cases innocent people get caught in the way regardless of whether it is domestic or international terrorism.

[David H]

I thought this was an interesting graph.  

http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/attacks-on-transportation-targets-like-those-in-brussels-have-become-rarer/

It makes me wonder of these kinds of terrorist attacks are getting more media attention now precisely because they are rarer and therefore more newsworthy.

[Pettytyrant101]

{{{{{{Just watched the 2nd episode of Inside Obama's White House, the BBC documentary, this one on Obamacare- I had no idea it was so hard for him to get it passed-by his own Democratic party I had always been under the impression that a national health care of some sort had been a Democratic goal since the Kennedy's. I had no idea there was such a large and strong part of the Democratic party which opposed it, it seems, almost as much as the Republicans do}}}