So what's the problem with religious people not wanting to be forced to display a pride flag?
Aren't conservatives Christians of the same mindset? — Swanty

Sure! 100%. I really do understand the issues that conservatives have with many aspects of modern culture and society. One of the questions in the OP is whether the principles of tolerance and inclusiveness have gone 'too far'. I put case that up as an example of those kinds of tensions. My post was not at all intended as discriminatory against Muslims.

So what's the problem with religious people not wanting to be forced to display a pride flag? — Swanty

That wasn't the issue. They would not allow others to display the pride flag, banning it from being flown on city property.

@Wayfarer
Well,I'm trying to be charitable,and I find it discriminatory,especially from a thinking bloke like yourself.

And just to clarify,what do you mean by tolerance and inclusivity have gone to far?

From whose perspective? Secular liberals? So since when are they the arbiters of tolerance and truth?

@Banno
I haven't seen a trusted media link.

But let's say it's true. How is that representative of Muslims at large? Or migrants? Xenophobia much.

And just to clarify,what do you mean by tolerance and inclusivity have gone to far? — Swanty

I gave an example that I thought illustrates some of the issues, which was apparently interpreted by yourself as 'discriminatory against Muslims', although it wasn't intended as such.

The fact that you react so violently at the mere mention kind of illustrates the point at issue.

@Wayfarer
Wow! So now you interpret my reaction as violent!

This is exactly the kind of racist islamaphobic stereotype I was talking about.

Man,the sweet innocent liberal with "superior values" surely loves to resort to totally imaginary stereotypes when pushed.
Your attitude is the problem mate. You don't like Muslims like me telling you how we feel. It offends your "superior" sentiments and imperial worldview.

OK, ‘heated’, not ‘violent’. Which it undoubtedly is.

I haven't seen a trusted media link. — Swanty

Then you haven't looked. You are begging for a fight here, seeing hostility where there is none. In that you are playing into the stereotype you supposedly reject.

2010 we had the orchestrated "Arab spring"interventions,we have genocide in Palestine currently. The US engineered Ukraine conflict. And the less talked about western backed conflicts currently in Africa. — Swanty

Especially if you are an American, don't think that everything evolves around your navel.

You didn't engineer the "Arab Spring". You didn't engineer the Hamas operation "Al Aqsa Flood" and the Israeli response to it. And you didn't engineer the war in Ukraine as you didn't engineer the various revolutions that Ukraine has had.

You only participated in them, tried to influence the outcome. The US was one actor among many. And many not the most important actor. Some times not even the most important foreign actor. Engineering means that someone has been prime instigator of something.

Western haughty hubris has simply transitioned from thinking about "the burden of the white man" to this idea of everything bad happening in the World somehow happening because of the West (and especially the US). In this totally (and unintentionally) arrogant way this idea sidelines totally the actual actors in the countries and in the regions where the conflicts happen and overemphasize your own importance. People and countries are either poor victims or then henchmen of the West actions, not independent actors with their own objectives.

I think this idea is perfectly shown in two very different commentators, namely in the arguments of John Mearsheimer and Noam Chomsky. Mersheimer starts with his theory of great powers and simply disregard domestic politics of the nations themselves. He actually has said this quite clearly himself. Now, let's think about this: would it be reasonable to disregard domestic politics when it comes to the US foreign policy? Is "the blob" really so independent of US domestic politics? That would be strange, but somehow not strange when it's other countries. Where Mearsheimer sees a chess game, others might not see just a game between other powers. But why should Mearsheimer care about what Putin thinks about internal politics and the situation of Russia, when he has his theory of great power competition to explain everything?

Noam Chomsky disregards foreign actors in another way: he sees as his role as an intellectual to criticize US foreign policy and leaves the critique of other countries to "the dissidents" of these countries. Again just like with Mersheimer there's a problem when Chomsky then explains the origins of some conflict or war from this viewpoint. It totally sidelines that local actors, other non-US actors and their agenda and thus the explanation is in the end that everything as a result of US involvement. Yet it is obvious that in many cases these conflict would happen with or without US involvement.

Yet the real reason is that both Mearsheimer and Chomsky sell what people want to hear. They don't want to hear a confusing story about events they know little about where the US and other powers come to do their own thing.

The book "confessions of an economic hitman" shows how some of this economic thuggery is achieved and maintained. — Swanty

I've read that one, have it in my bookshelf. However, don't think that this is solely something that the West does. The unipolar moment has already gone.

@Wayfarer
Your just backtracking,obfuscatingand taking no responsibility for your mistakes and ignorance.

It's obvious you know very little about Muslims,Islam or realities on the ground.
Yours is media hogwash which appeases your western superiority narrative.

@Banno
Another anti religious liberal displays his exenophobia and anxiety to stereotype when under pressure.

I suspect you are not long for this forum.

@Banno

Yes the great "liberal " weapon when confronted withTruth,run and censor!

Democracy Song by Leonard Cohen


It's coming through a hole in the air,
From those nights in Tiananmen Square.
It's coming from the feel
That this ain't exactly real
Or it's real, but it ain't exactly there

From the wars against disorder
From the sirens night and day
From the fires of the homeless
From the ashes of the gay
Democracy is coming to the U.S.A.

It's coming through a crack in the wall
On a visionary flood of alcohol
From the staggering account
Of the Sermon on the Mount
Which I don't pretend to understand at all

It's coming from the silence
On the dock of the bay
From the brave, the bold, the battered
Heart of Chevrolet
Democracy is coming to the U.S.A.

It's coming from the sorrow in the street
The holy places where the races meet
From the homicidal bitchin'
That goes down in every kitchen
To determine who will serve and who will eat

From the wells of disappointment
Where the women kneel to pray
For the grace of God in the desert here
And the desert far away
Democracy is coming to the U.S.A.

Sail on, sail on
O mighty Ship of State!
To the Shores of Need
Past the Reefs of Greed
Through the Squalls of Hate
Sail on, sail on, sail on, sail on

It's coming to America first
The cradle of the best and of the worst.
It's here they got the range
And the machinery for change
And it's here they got the spiritual thirst

It's here the family's broken
And it's here the lonely say
That the heart has got to open
In a fundamental way
Democracy is coming to the U.S.A.

It's coming from the women and the men
O baby, we'll be making love again
We'll be going down so deep
The river's going to weep
And the mountain's going to shout Amen!
It's coming like the tidal flood
Beneath the lunar sway
Imperial, mysterious
In amorous array
Democracy is coming to the U.S.A.

Sail on, sail on
O mighty Ship of State!
To the Shores of Need
Past the Reefs of Greed
Through the Squalls of Hate
Sail on, sail on, sail on, sail on

I'm sentimental, if you know what I mean
I love the country but I can't stand the scene
And I'm neither left or right
I'm just staying home tonight
Getting lost in that hopeless little screen

But I'm stubborn as those garbage bags
That Time cannot decay
I'm junk but I'm still holding up
This little wild bouquet
Democracy is coming to the U.S.A.

That's hilarious. Great song. I was going to post Cohen's Everybody Knows.

@ssu
I'm not American.

I do agree with you in saying that we shouldn't ignore domestic policies of colonised countries,or use western imperialism as a cop out for the corruption of eastern governments.

I 100% agree that colonised countries took western money and used this to oppress their own lower and muddle classes,and enrich themselves.They bear responsibility for that.

When I talk about the ongoing imperialism I said Europe AND the US,with the US and UK being the prime movers of weaponry and economic oppression. And this imperialism is only achieved with the tacit approval of the ruling class of the imperialised country.

Chomsky and merscheimer are academics/experts pimping off handringing and criticising US policy without the full world picture.

But my bottom line is the west is still the main instigator and supplier of weapons and money for conflict and world economic trade conflict.
You can't dispute that.
And just for full clarity,I regard Russia as European as well.

muddle classes — Swanty

Is this a jokey play on words or are you a New Zealander?

And just to clarify,what do you mean by tolerance and inclusivity have gone to far? — Swanty

You’ll find that the only bigotry allowed here on the forum is religious bigotry.

I wasn't comparing the US and the Taliban, I was pointing out that the US did attempt to set up a liberal democracy in Afghanistan, as well as a domestic military capable of defending it, spending 20 years and hundreds of billions in the process.

That military collapsed on contact with the enemy and routed and domestic support for democracy never became particularly strong.

The early Cold War solution to the Taliban and their refusal to deliver up Al Qaeda would have been to back the more secular Northern Alliance, made up of various minority groups, Tajiks, Hazaras, Uzbeks, etc. This was indeed the initial US strategy in terms of deposing the Taliban, and it worked great, driving them out of power mostly through the use of US airpower with a few forward observers on the ground.

The US could have backed that group, encouraged some sort of stable power sharing structure, and offered to provide them with the support they needed to maintain control of the military situation. Then they'd have leverage over them they could use to push women's rights, liberalization, etc.

Perhaps this would have worked better (it seems unlikely to have worked worse). Korea was a repressive dictatorship when the US was first propping it up after all. Maybe it wouldn't have. Iran is probably the key counter example here.

American values make it hard to use America's massive military supremecy. Could America stop the Houthis from firing missiles at shipping? Sure, that country is already starving and in crisis. A 19th century style punitive campaign that knocks out its power plants, water system, and port infrastructure could be done in a weekend, or the US Navy could simply stop letting the aid shipments the country relies on in. Would this really be a better option though?

The difficulty is that bad actors will leverage Western reluctance to use force, which is why you can have a country relying on aid ships to sustain itself willing to fire on shipping, or Iran willing to send proxies to rain rockets down on US bases even as it is virtually defenseless to punitive retaliation. But any sort of military conflict that tries to minimize civilian losses is extremely difficult and it becomes vastly more difficult if one also wants to engage in democratic nation building.

Do violent conquests sometimes eventually benefit the subject populace? It certainly seems it has happened in history, e.g. Roman colonization of Britain and other northern European areas. But those seem far more the exception than the rule. And even there, the benefits accrued to the descendents of the Gauls, etc., who would come to identify as Romans, not to those in the first generation, who were subject to the pillaging, looting, and slave taking of the initial Roman conquest (not that they weren't subject to this in their own wars already though).

I would certainly agree that some cultures are better than others. Anyone saying otherwise is delusional. This is simple due to the fact that differences necessarily have different values. The obvious difficulty is measuring differing items against each other and this is why many abstain from commenting.

Whether the "Western" traditions are better than others is open to debate. Overall, I think yes. In many ways other cultural attitudes surpass more Western ideals. Undoubtedly there is an exchange where one set of views benefits another and so they assimilate or replace.

All cultural traditions have certain political prohibitions and taboos. Where the 'better' cultural traditions seem to excel is in how the breaking of these 'regulations' is handled.

Societies that expel or annihilate those speaking out against them generally fall. We need a Diogenes or a some form of courtly jester to humiliate us. I leave you with a poem I wrote some years ago:

Rompa Stompa

Aristotle chortles mimetic
a parody of a witless lick-spittle lampooned
comedy sculpts its laughter crafter
un-mastering the mastery of the masterly majesty.

Jesters gesture to the King
satire dripping they prance and fling
their sullied words in simian farce
un-mastering the mastery of their masterly majesty.

Chaplin clowns around his silent circus
flagellants of foolery slapped with wit sticks
raucously erupting Bacchus takes a bow
un-mastering the mastery of our masterly majesty.

Heads crack open with screams
beams split faces bringing to knees
the lesser man mocked and defrocked
un-mastered the master is regally flogged.

@Janus. A typo,thats also a fabulous truthful pun,so kept in.
I'm English born,Indian,Pakistani,Zimbabwean,Iranian heritage.

@T clark

I've seen plenty of secular bigotry and xenephobia here.

I've seen plenty of secular bigotry and xenephobia here. — Swanty

I don't think it is actually secular bigotry. It is just that we are in a philosophy forum, and philosophy itself has always confronted religion.

There are threads on Christianity. I can't remember if there is any regarding Islam. I took part in them with my deepest respectful behaviour. I even discovered Kazantzakis thanks to Alkis Piskas. My image of Jesus changed to better, but religion still has complex features to my understanding. If you want to start a thread about a religious topic, I don't think you would have issues. But be open to receiving criticism!

@javi2541997

Philosophy does confront religion,but can also back it up. There are religious philosophers.

I'm very critical of many thelogians,because of their political bigotry.

I can take criticisms of aspects of religious thought,but liberalism is itself a dominant religious like narrative,and displays intolerance towards any criticism of LGBTQ or western values.

Are western values beyond criticism?
And why is liberalism the arbiter of truth?

But my bottom line is the west is still the main instigator and supplier of weapons and money for conflict and world economic trade conflict.
You can't dispute that. — Swanty

That is true, especially if we view Russia (Soviet Union) being an European and Western country. Although even this is starting to change as many countries are having their own weapons industries.

From the Cold War division we are witnessing just how countries that technically are allies of the US are supporting different sides in conflicts as in Libya and Sudan. In the Ukrainian war the Turkish Bayraktar drones, Iranian attack drones and North Korean ammunitions are there alongside the Western and Russian weapon systems. And the first Congo War has been dubbed the Africa's first World War and the Second Congo war as the Great African war as a multitude of African nations backed one side or the other. That few people know about the First and Second Congo War that killed over five million people tells how our focus on the West blinds us and how dominant the Mearsheimer/Chomsky etc focus entirely on the US and the West is. There simply isn't any narrative of Western involvement stirring up Congo conflict, only the historical reasons of European colonialism and Cold War US support for Zaire. Those reasons don't tell how a small country as Rwanda that had just experienced it's own genocidal civil war then attacks Zaire in 1996.

This is totally different from the era of Cecil Rhodes and the time when the Hilaire Belloc declared "Whatever happens, we have got The Maxim gun, and they have not." During the Cold War the conflicts could be seen as part of the Superpower struggle with usually the other Superpower backing the side fighting the ally of the other one. Now it's simply wrong to assume that these conflicts are some kind of struggle between China and the US and their proxies, even if we clearly see an anti-US block forming with now North Korean troops fighting in Europe.

We can be critical of the actions what the West does, yet we shouldn't make up these narratives where everything is about us or that the West hasn't done anything correctly.

@ssu

I do agree,we shouldn't absolve non western nations for instigating conflicts or minimise their role in economic thuggery.

Chomsky et al are just goofballs who hide the different actors involved.

But if we look at the finance required for these types of actions,then the UK,the US,Russia,china,Saudi arabia,Iran etc always have a hand in weapons sales and political support.

I'm very critical of the oil rich states as well as the west.

With regard to your comment about Cecil Rhodes,well the west still has world banking,which is like a maxim gun.

But if we look at the finance required for these types of actions,then the UK,the US,Russia,china,Saudi arabia,Iran etc always have a hand in weapons sales and political support. — Swanty

And that is quite a mixed lot. So yes, there is the arms dealer to be found. And the country willing to play the "Great game". But as your list shows, those aren't just Western powers.

With regard to your comment about Cecil Rhodes,well the west still has world banking,which is like a maxim gun. — Swanty

The financial sector is the last remnant of the British Empire still working for the UK. And Wall Street is still dominant. When the current global monetary system collapses, that might also change. That might happen in a few years time or after several decades. Who knows, but in the end it will collapse as people and countries will pile debt onto more debt until they cannot.

Are western values beyond criticism?
And why is liberalism the arbiter of truth? — Swanty

When and where has this been stated by anyone here?

@ssu

And that is quite a mixed lot. So yes, there is the arms dealer to be found. And the country willing to play the "Great game". But as your list shows, those aren't just Western powers.

It's not just western powers,but it's dominated by western finance and military force.
The US has military bases all round the world.

And to be frank,the military industrial complex comprises the evil cooperation of west and east to economically oppress and suppress people all round the world.

The problem is militant capitalism,led by Europe and it's British colony,the US.

@I like sushi
Just read this thread,and the supposed superiority of western "values".

Western values include war,economic oppression,imperialism and broken families.