TheApple

oh Debo,

This is NOT a male thing.  It is a good vs evil thing and yes there is evil and evil will never be conquered and thus there will always be conflict even if men become extinct.

Mister D: do you really believe that wars are matter of good or  evil thing?

good vs evil?   who is the evil part ?  the others?  if we ask "the others" , then they would say tha same.

In my opinion, a war is always a matter of power. (wealth, territoties, oil, control,power itself, etc)

Okaaay....well, I'd say we are only scratching the surface of what this is about.   Yes, war is a struggle for power.   But, WHY is it so important to have power over others.... so one country is strong and it conquers another...which shows it's power....but what makes one person want to control and over-power another?  

If you are strong you can make a smaller person (or country) do as you please...what is so satisfying about that?   The winners strut around showing off their bravado, but what have they accomplished?   They have imposed their will upon another.   What makes that so "tasty"?  

Yes, John...it has something to do with ego (I think)....but, what is it about the male ego that needs to be fed in this manner?

I know that women are capable of horrendous acts of violence, too.   But, I do not believe it is in our nature to strike down others so we can stand above them, triumphant.   Even female rulers ... they have achieved their position by behaving like men, in a man's world.... going to war for them is a matter of defending what they have...

The initiators of war, the birth-mothers of killing for gain, I believe, is a man's realm.    I think women kill to defend.   But, it doesn't seem to be our nature to agress for gain.  Maybe my view is skewed.   I know that a woman can turn cold, hard and ferocious when necessary....but, for no other reason than to go next door and stomp the other guys ass...doesn't seem to be a motivator for us.    Am I wrong?

Yet, men seem to need to show their "prowess"... to overcome adversity with heated aggression... and, in some instances, the "adversity" seems to be nothing more than restlessness and boredom.    It seems to me that men (on the whole, in the Big Picture) just like to hit one another.   

I loved that movie "The Quiet Man".... I've watched it a gadzillion times....probably could recite it.... and, I'm not sure why  ~  these men fight for the love of the fight.    And I don't, intellectually, comprehend that.

I see that the human animal had to kill other animals to survive ~ so this syndrome might have begun back in our ancient roots... but, why has it continued?

When I used to ponder this, I came to the idea that man first killed for food.   Food and shelter, those are prime motivators ~ it was a kill or die world then....but, now... ?      I  considered this long and hard....then I wondered about places on the planet where food was abundant and their societies were cut-off from the rest of the world....places like Tahiti.

So, I travelled there.   I hungered for information about their social standards.... if food were abundant, and the weather was so temperate that shelter was a simple issue.... would their society still wage war?

Why is "power" a motivator?   What makes it so rewarding to control another?  

I arrive at this website, find 'like' minds, and some not-so-"like"....but rather than going around trying to make others think and act the way I do, I find stimulation and interest in those who do not think the same as I do....I don't try to make them think or be like me.   And I notice that most other people here are not attempting to "bend" or "change" others.   Even when a person speaks-up with a different POV we engage in conversation, interact, and if the conversation seems at a standstill, not moving forward....if the others are spouting rhetoric that we completely do not agree with, we simply move to a different conversation ~ change directions ~ stop engaging.

As adults we realize that we cannot really change someone else, true change comes from within .... either a person can "hear" your point, or they cannot.   If they cannot, all the talk in the world will most-likely not work.    So, we leave them to their own devices.

Isn't this the way a "civilized" world should work?   It seems sensible.  It seems logical and reasonable.   If you don't like the way things are ~move to where you do like it.  

When you kill someone, there is no possibility for change...just absence...absence of ideas.  

Doesn't "avoidance" make more sense than war?  

I can hear, already, some voices saying: but, sometimes you cannot avoid conflict because of the actions of others.   And, this is true.

So, what I am asking is why do humans find satisfaction in having power over others?   I do not find this kind of thinking to be "satisfying", "rewarding" or even "sane".... what is it about subjugating others that is gratifying?

What is it about feeling powerful that is more valuable than human lives?

War is because war has always been, think to your history books; has there

ever really been a time some type of war was going on or getting ready to be

on.  Off hand I cann't think of any, even during the days of the Roman Empire.

mrcrisp says ...

War is because war has always been, think to your history books; has there

ever really been a time some type of war was going on or getting ready to be

on.  Off hand I cann't think of any, even during the days of the Roman Empire.

Mr. Crisp,

I'm not going to let you get away with that answer (smile)...because it is too simple....that was my Father's answer : war has always been and will always be because it is the nature of man to war.    

We're much more complex than that....if it is the nature of man to kill, then why do we think it is so wrong?   Why do we bother to value human life at all? 

Ahhhh-so.   Leave it to John....yes, this is the very thing I was hoping to discover!    Did you read the article?   Parts of it were from Scientific American (which I have always found difficult to read....spend a lot of time just looking up the vocabulary, ie. polygny, dimorphous...but, I eventually get through it.)

So now, the blame for male aggression goes, ultimately, to the female!    hahaha, of course, hahaha....not that I'm actually looking for "blame", really I want explanation.    This did attempt to explain.   What it could not explain is why, after thousands of years of evolution, the aggressive nature of human males has failed to evolve.

Still, it seems clear to me that we have failed to evolve.  

It is certain, with no doubt, that some of us are more highly evolved than others....

...the answer to these issues of aggression may not be found for thousands of years yet to come...

sigh

no help in sight

the ship apparently going down

I say: "Let's Parteeee!"

 Dear debo,

The Sudan? No. Saudi Arabia - Yes, for 19 years.

The Quran makes NO mention of those "virgins" etc. 

They also promise them multiple rewards in heaven (72 virgins per 'martyr' - a heterosexual male I assume!) in addition to securing heaven for the entire family of the martyr. Such religious justifications are deeply problematic from a religious point of view. To start with, the 72 virgins and the tickets to heaven for the entire family are attributed to the Prophet Mohammad (pbuh) and are not mentioned in the Qur'an."

Now, there are many "Hadith" - later commentaries on the Quran: Hadith can be categorized with regards to its authenticity into 5 types, 1) Sahih (authentic), 2) Hasan (sound), 3) Dha'eef (weak), 4) Dha'eef Jiddan (very weak), and 5) Mawdhoo (fabricated).

Sunan al-Tirmidhi Hadith 2562 says:

The Prophet Muhammad was heard saying: "The smallest reward for the people of Paradise is an abode where there are 80,000 servants and 72 wives, over which stands a dome decorated with pearls, aquamarine, and ruby, as wide as the distance from Al-Jabiyyah [a Damascus suburb] to Sana'a [Yemen]"  

This is as a very weak Hadith that has no Sanad -- line or sequence of narration. Although listed in an authoritative collection, this particular Hadith has technical weaknesses in its chain of transmitters and is therefore not considered impeccable. As a result, Muslims are not required to believe in it. Even if the Hadith was true, there is nothing about it that says that if someone commits suicide they would get 72 virgins in paradise.  

Muslims know that the description of paradise or heaven in Hadiths and Quran is allegorical. If not, then Allah would have allowed us to take our bodies with us when we die. But the vehicle by which we could enjoy the physical things (especially 72 virgins ) mentioned as being in heaven, is left behind here in this world to rot and decay away. So we know for a fact that for heavenly rewards, physical things of this world are used to describe things totally non-physical. 

 Dear debo,

Yup, the "Quran" is the "Koran" - the Holy Book of Islam (like the New Testament is for Christians), written by Muhammed,

Muslims believe that the Quran is a record of the exact words revealed by God through the Angel Gabriel to the Prophet and that It was memorized by Muhammad and then dictated to his companions, and written down by scribes (most Muslims believe that Muhammed was illiterate.)

The Hadith mentioned above is considered to be #4 - i.e. very weak.

It's not so much "tribes" that become terrorists as individuals, who interpret their Holy Book in as many different ways as Christians interpret the Bible.

You ask "Why doesn't the larger body of Muslims deal with these renegades?   Why do they allow the terrorists to terrorize?   Aren't there more Muslims in the world than there are Christians?   Why don't they just squelch these guys?"

Well. why don't Christians deal with renegade "Christian sects/cults" (e.g. The Branch Davidians,  The Body, Christian Identity,  The Way International. "The Christian Identity Movement: In the 1990s, Identity criminal activity continued apace, including efforts by an  Oklahoma Identity minister, Willie Ray Lampley, to commit a series of bombings in the summer of 1995 in the wake of the Oklahoma City bombing by Timothy McVeigh. The following year, the Montana Freemen, whose leaders were Identity, made headlines for their "paper terrorism" tactics and their 81-day standoff with the federal government. In 1998, Eric Rudolph, who had been associated with Identity ministers such as Nord Davis and Dan Gayman, became a fugitive after allegedly bombing gay bars, the Atlanta Summer Olympics, and an abortion clinic. The following year, Buford Furrow, a former Aryan Nations security guard, went on a shooting spree at a Jewish Community Center in Los Angeles, wounding four children and an adult, and later killing a Filipino-American postal worker."

Christians apparently don't feel the need to "police" Christian sects/cults; Hindus don't seem to feel the need to "police" Hindu sects/cults (that have killed literally thousands of Muslims in India), so why do you suppose that Muslims would feel that need?

And no, most figures still rate Christianity as the largest religion, though Islam is supposedly the "fastest-growing" one.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religions

http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0904108.html

 Dear debo,

Don't feel bad - we're ALL frightfully uninformed about so many things. But  even though it may make you feel overwhelmed and disappointed to be informed, it's better to be so than not.

YES FER,

This is why we need to be responsible for our own actions and behaviors.   A thinking mind is not so easily fooled...or led.

Which brings us back to why teachers are so valuable, and should be respected for their efforts!   (tah-da!)

It's time for me to get something to eat...dinner, yum.  

See ya tomorrow!

John,  thanx for your care ~ right back atcha!

~debo

 Dear debo and FER,

No historian may ever be able to unwrap the mystery of how a Hitler could have driven a whole nation mad - at the time probably the most advanced industrial nation in the world. But curious scholars will keep trying to explain it.

"The fascination here is one of beauty and the beast --- cool, patrician Speer alongside a gruesome psychopath who, with hypnotising speeches (combined with the new invention called radio) convinced an entire country that his strange view of history and evil was the truth. And the people bought into his schizophrenia; indeed, one might surmise that the whole of Germany from 1933 to 1945 was a state lunatic asylum. Hitler's madness --- and the cruelty born to that madness --- became the norm while normal elements of kindness and humanity were viciously expunged. The land of Bach, Mozart, Hegel, Beethoven, Goethe, Schubert, Schiller, Freud, and Einstein was subsumed to a neo-romantic monstrosity."

http://www.ralphmag.org/BS/new.html

The Madness of Crowds: Hitler could play crowds like Bach could play the organ, touching their dreams and hopes, but even more so their fears, insecurities, prejudices, and desperate need for reassurance.

There are Hitlers around us. Remember the sects, evil people manipulating the ignorance or the lack of a firm beliefs of people.

In Mexico there is a producer (music) that (now in jail) abused, raped, brain wash, separed from their families more that 12 girls.

Fisrt he convinced two girls that he was a god in the music business and  he could make them famous singer. and he did it with one of them.She  was very popular here in Mexico but the cost was very high for her she was rape many times treat as dog, she had to eat under the producer's desk, behave as dog for him, had sex with other girls in front of him, she was obligated to bring more girls to him. As she was famous many girls wanted to be as her  and they accepted to be separated from their parents and the parents agreed.

When one of the girls scaped the parents told the police, then the producer  and the two girls scape to Brasil, taken with them some girls, they were captured. when the police asked the girls what were their feeling about  this gay they (all) say the same as if they were hypnotize."he is good- he's a good person, I want to stay with him, I'm not obligated to be with him, he is inocent"

Now he is in jail and the girls were taken back to their families, the two girls keeps working in the music business.

the nomsters is Sergio Andrade and the girls Gloria Trevi and Mary Boquitas.

I see a few and me.