Soldier beheaded / hacked to death in broad daylight

[Limited]

This is a truely horrific story, today in London 2 males randomly attacked a soldier (who was wearing a help for heros tshirt).

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2329089/Woolwich-attack-Two-men-hack-soldier-wearing-Help-Heroes-T-shirt-death-machetes-suspected-terror-attack.html

(http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2329089/Woolwich-attack-Two-men-hack-soldier-wearing-Help-Heroes-T-shirt-death-machetes-suspected-terror-attack.html)http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2329236/Woolwich-attack--Moment-heroic-woman-tries-remonstrate-knife-wielding-soldier-killer-police-arrived-scene.html

They ran him over with their car, hacked him with meat cleavers and chopped his head off then dragged his body into the middle of the street. According to sources the attack lasted 20 minutes.

Some bystanders actually shielded the victim whilst the attackers stood right next to them, and a women also confronted one of the men whilst he was welding a big nice. Truly brave people right there.

What is scary is how calm and and collected the attackers were afterwards, talking to bypassers calmly and waiting for police to show up. Interview of the attacker filmed by a bypasser, has blood on his hands and welding 2 knifes

H (http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=d0f_1369235265)eres someone live tweeting what they saw:
http://i.imgur.com/Q2LVBlh.jpg

I understand bad things happen all the time, but this amount of violence, so random and in broad daylight is shocking.

More Live Leak content (http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=d0f_1369235265)contains pretty bad pictures.

[Patrickssj6]

I understand bad things happen all the time, but this amount of violence, so random and in broad daylight is shocking.
Maybe you should listen to the first thing that guy says in the interview. It is shocking to us because it is rare that such cruelty happens in our part of the world.

[DarkHalo003]

It's like when the Boston bombing happened. Is it an awful occurrence? Of course, but it happens almost regularly in other parts of the world.

[TVTyrant]

It's like when the Boston bombing happened. Is it an awful occurrence? Of course, but it happens almost regularly in other parts of the world.
The point of living in the U.S. or U.K. or Canada or Germany or whatever your Western country of choice is that shit like this isn't supposed to happen here. Especially in countries like England where almost all forms of weapons are banned in the first place.

[Btcc22]

It's surprising how calm people are despite the guy walking around covered in blood and with a machete in his hand.

[Warsaw]

KEEP CALM AND CARRY ON.

[Patrickssj6]

The point of living in the U.S. or U.K. or Canada or Germany or whatever your Western country of choice is that shit like this isn't supposed to happen here. Especially in countries like England where almost all forms of weapons are banned in the first place.
Considering how many people live in those countries, I am always surprised that this kind of stuff happens that rarely...probably most cases are not even resolved. E.g. all those people who are kept captive in some basement for over decades? If those people are freed 2 years from now, it means that there are being captive right now and no one knows.


It's surprising how calm people are despite the guy walking around covered in blood and with a machete in his hand.
I noticed that as well, probably an effect of everything being pretty surreal (the guy beheads someone with a machete and afterwards stays calm and does not go on a rampage or at least try to flee?). I am someone who usually gets involved but in this case, I would have reacted the same way probably.

[neuro]

i made a post on reddit, and now the internet is upset with me ^^

[DarkHalo003]

The point of living in the U.S. or U.K. or Canada or Germany or whatever your Western country of choice is that shit like this isn't supposed to happen here. Especially in countries like England where almost all forms of weapons are banned in the first place.
I was talking from a humanist standpoint. Given our countries are supposed to be safer, that desensitizes us to these horrific crimes happening elsewhere around the world. Are they awful no matter where they happen? Hell yeah, but the Western civilization that seems to have all of the power/influence only seems to be worked up when it happens in Western countries. By civilization, I don't mean government, I mean the general spectrum of people within that civilization. A bombing in Boston? "That can't ever happen! We have to lockdown the city just to capture two fugitives!" A bombing in Baghdad? "Oh, that's pretty bad, but it happens all of the time from militant forces." See the point? It's like how you have people with lots of money making massive pizzas and shit all while there are starving/homeless right around the corner.

Inb4someonesaysmerica.

Also inb4someonecallsmeafucktardforpointingouttheobviou sflawsofwesternsocieties.

I'm with Patrick on this one, this stuff happens far more even in Western countries, but the media either doesn't care to report it or people simply don't know that it's happening. That prospect alone is disturbing.

[TVTyrant]

Pretty sure people don't often get beheaded in the streets by Muslims in Murica very often. I see your point about abductions and the cruelty there, but I think you can see mine as well.

People do get all freaked out when things go wrong in Baghdad. They go blow up a car bomb in front of the house of whoever they think the perpetrators were. You're comparing a legally declared war zone with countries that haven't been in any kind of domestic conflict since 1945. Only England with the troubles has had to deal with these sorts of issues. The point isn't that it happened. That part is over. The point is to find the person who did this and bring them to justice. I'm not all freaked out by it. I'm just saying that the response should be to find this man/these men and prosecute them to the furthest extent of the law in the country these events occurred in.

Preventing these kinds of things isn't even the key aspect. It's responding to them properly.

[DarkHalo003]

Pretty sure people don't often get beheaded in the streets by Muslims in Murica very often. I see your point about abductions and the cruelty there, but I think you can see mine as well.

People do get all freaked out when things go wrong in Baghdad. They go blow up a car bomb in front of the house of whoever they think the perpetrators were. You're comparing a legally declared war zone with countries that haven't been in any kind of domestic conflict since 1945. Only England with the troubles has had to deal with these sorts of issues. The point isn't that it happened. That part is over. The point is to find the person who did this and bring them to justice. I'm not all freaked out by it. I'm just saying that the response should be to find this man/these men and prosecute them to the furthest extent of the law in the country these events occurred in.

Preventing these kinds of things isn't even the key aspect. It's responding to them properly.
Both of us are right, but your last statement is the real key here. I honestly don't think many countries with influence have responded right, mainly because most of them are doing it in their own interest.

[ChemicalFizz]

otGLteHwGu4

There is something wrong here. Very fucking wrong.

Everything about the response to this man's death is wrong: local, national, and international. Locally you have a bunch of scared witnesses too afflicted by the bystander effect and apathy to give a fuck and just walk past listening to this fucking animal's rant speech. Ok, that's how it usually turns out here too (Boston bombing, the NYC subway pushing-killing, etc), whatever. You'd think someone else would step up to the plate and do some justice. Then we have the police, who for some reason arrive only after 20 minutes (in a city??) have passed, stop and apprehend the two killers. The next part really irks me. We have this poor guy, a soldier nonetheless, who has just been humiliatingly and brutally murdered in front of thousands, and the response to this by both British leaders and internationals is to use this opportunity for political advantage? Your citizen, a soldier under your service, has just been killed by your common enemy and your first priority is to "keep the peace" amongst your "damaged" citizens? The worst part is the religious outcry of Muslim leaders who vehemently try to affirm that this was an exclusive act of radical extremists and that they and their people are not associated with it in any way.

Believe me, we fucking know. We already fucking know. You've had to make this clear ever since 9/11 and UBL. At this point, you should shut the fuck up, tell the world how saddened you are about this death, offer your support and help, and keep quiet about Islam for the time being, because quite frankly, it's not looking good for you. I would be equally ashamed if these two murderers were radical Christians, and I'd expect the pope to do the same and keep his trap shut about any religious preaching.

I don't care that this happens in the streets of the Middle East every day. Mostly because I'm positive that they kill each other much more often than they die from collateral damage by NATO forces. Don't believe me? Just look at the immigration rate. Their people emigrate to escape that and provide something better to their children. Therefore, you, the murderer, prove no point by doing the same here; all you've done is commit murder, that is it, nothing more to it, no exception, and you deserve death, to the same humiliating and brutal extent by which you've killed the soldier. My point is, the death of this guy is being totally ignored in favor of furthering the radical Islamist issue, which we're all a little sick of by now.

To the murderers: You said in your speech that this was an "eye for an eye, a tooth for tooth." Obviously, by those standards, you deserve the same. Throw these two into the same barracks where that soldier came from and let friends of the victim deal justice with knives and machetes. End of story.

[Bodzilla]

i think people over look the bigger issue, because it's more comfortable or convenient, especially if it contradicts their personal beliefs.

We live in the most technologically proficient age, with a greater understanding of ourselves and the universe. We know more then we ever have before in our entire history,
and yet from this, we allow people to be taught wrongly, we allow them to teach their children and fill their heads full of miss-information.

At this point we can definitively prove that all religions are bullshit.

We know exactly where we came from and what we are. "We are made of star stuff, we are a way for the universe to know itself"
So how can we allow people in our own country's, our neighbours hell the world to keep believing this ultimately DE-evoltionary lie.

Heres the quick version.
Big bang happened and spread dust and matter throughout an expanding universe.
that dust collected and formed stars
stars run off nuclear fission, and create new elements over the course of their life until they eventually become unstable, die and or explode.
Those new elements and dust remains help for new stars and planets, and with increased elementary compounds.
In the right area of a stars orbit with the right materials, life is then possible.
Over time that Life forms adapts and evolves, and it's from there that we come from.

We know this, all the evidence ever collected in the history of our entire species point to these conclusions and have been proven to have been not the result of magic.
Yet religion still exists, and we continue to allow the bar for ourselves to be lowered, so diluted, so corrupted and so stifled under the archaic legacy of people who where not as informed as us, dictate our future.

And that makes me sad.

[neuro]

all religious people need to be exterminated.

FOR THE GREATER GOOD.

i've been saying this for ever already.

edit:
just to be clear, not a trollpost, i'm dead fucking serious.

if ALL religion were wiped clean off the face of the earth, maybe some other bullshit would end up taking it's place, but ti'll never be the same thing ever.

if all scientifically aquied knowledge were wiped off the earth, people wuold figure out THE EXACT SAME FUCKING THING eventually, and it'd be THE EXACT SAME.


seriously i hate every last one of you people who subscribe to any of the major religions.
you can have your own ideas about stuff, but when yuo let yourself be willingly indoctrinated and ignorant of everything that goes around you, you need to fuck off and die in a hole

[Warsaw]

Bod, bro, stars run off of nuclear fusion. Not fission.

[DarkHalo003]

Bod and neuro really have had the short end of the stick when it comes to religion it appears. Not all religious folk and religions are bad. You look at religion like it's a weapon, which it can be, but stating that all religious people should be exterminated is no different than most of the other radical extremists declaring all of the heathens be exterminated. I've met a lot of different people, ranging from Christians to Atheists when it comes down to their beliefs/non-beliefs and frankly I have met a great many wonderful people who would take a bullet for anyone regardless of their beliefs. I'm not talking police or military either.

Guys, if you let these assholes ruin your perception of what people are based off of labels to the point of such prejudice/hatred, then you're almost no better than they are in the same sense: just prejudice/ignorant assholes.

EDIT: For the record Bodz, there is no evidence proving/disproving the existence/nonexistence of a spritual realm/creator. You can call me a fuckwit all you want for not being an atheist/agnostic, but the only bullshit being disproven in regards to religion is the radical extremism coming from the same ignorant assholes you and Neuro are raging (rightfully) over.

[Bodzilla]

I never called you a fuckwit (i think your deluded but thats the besides my point.)and i dont want you exterminated i just want you to use your head.

theres no evidence to prove that the celestial teapot doesn't exist. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell%27s_teapot)
or the flying spaghetti monster (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flying_Spaghetti_Monster)
or the invisible pink unicorn.... (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Invisible_Pink_Unicorn)


but the only bullshit being disproven in regards to religion is the radical extremism coming from the same ignorant assholes you and Neuro are raging (rightfully) over. This is what i have a problem with. your lying to yourself, and you know it.
Every thing ever claimed by religion that has been scientifically proven has been NOT MAGIC.
Thats how silly this stuff is and it doesn't matter whether good people believe in it, all that matters is that we know it's bullshit and yet people still let their lives be dictated by it.
oh as as for fission vs fusion, your right it's fusion, it was like 3am in aus and i'd had about 8 or so drinks.

[Warsaw]

Lol, I figured, I was just trying to break the tension.

[DarkHalo003]

Yes Bodz, none of that has been disproved and it could very well exist. I am using my head and no I don't believe any of those exists. But because there is no evidence that disproves them, then there is always a possibility that they do exist, since there is no evidence stating otherwise. My point was simple advocacy.



This is what i have a problem with. your lying to yourself, and you know it.
Every thing ever claimed by religion that has been scientifically proven has been NOT MAGIC.
Thats how silly this stuff is and it doesn't matter whether good people believe in it, all that matters is that we know it's bullshit and yet people still let their lives be dictated by it.
oh as as for fission vs fusion, your right it's fusion, it was like 3am in aus and i'd had about 8 or so drinks.
Here's where I think you fell off the wagon on your way from the bar. You're taking this places I never went. I literally stated that religious radical extremism is the only bullshit being disproved and just that. I have no fucking clue what you're talking about. You're right, I never said you called me a fuckwit, but you and neuro both have in the past with these debates. At the same time, you don't know my beliefs at all anymore. Maybe you still think I'm the church-child I was back in 2008 when I first showed up here. That's all changed massively though. I'm not religious anymore because I think most religious institutions are socio-political factions that enforce mob mentality alongside being social constructs, sometimes as extreme as we see with radicals and how entire societies are enslaved to the mobmasters pulling the strings. Either way, you're far to assumptive and deflective. I have no fucking clue when you say I'm lying to myself and that I know I am. Like, for fucking real, you're following labeling based off of your own perceptions rather than taking into account that not all folks who have a religion are radical fucks.

[Bodzilla]

your point is a flawed analytical perspective.

The burden of proof lies with the people making the claims.
I could literally say anything i wanted and then say it's undetectable by humans or not understandable by humans and i could say really crazy shit like a galactic space alien brainwashed souls in volcanoes and thats where unhappiness came from.

My point isn't that because of radical retards we're worse off under religion. My point is that Ideals, beliefs and opinions written thousands of years ago by goat herders in a desert have no basis in the real world. And those opinions have continued to dictate our future by the use of their foot soldiers, you and anyone else religious through voting practices and social constructs that have continued to hamper our progressive nature and advancement of our knowledge, understanding and ultimately our species.

[Bodzilla]

You say you use your head and you dont believe that those things i pointed to exist, and yet you support something with the same amount of evidence.

[=sw=warlord]

*Walks into thread, sees what's going on walks back out*

I thought I was missing something having not been around for a while, same old bandwagons I see.

[DarkHalo003]

^I was wondering when you'd show up. This is pretty bad thread no?


You say you use your head and you dont believe that those things i pointed to exist, and yet you support something with the same amount of evidence.
The problem here Bodz is that you connect "using your head" with agnosticism/atheism. I can "use my head" and not be a radical extremist, while still believing in mysticism and theology. I'm not denying science and tangible evidence. If there is no evidence of something existing, but also no evidence that it does not exist, then it comes down to belief and mysticism as a choice of the believer. I'm not going out and killing people because they don't believe the same thing I do nor am I telling people they're degenerate because they don't believe the same thing I do.

Now are there religions or religious groups that create mob-mentality with/out the intention of it? Hell yes and it's one reason why I left the church. It's wrong when people pressure others into believing something they wouldn't believe otherwise. I should be fortunate because the moment I decided to believe in what I do I decided on my own without pressure. Don't group me with these religious groups as you see them because I'm not a part of them. You're absolutely right in terms of old expressions from 3,000+ years ago being outdated, like the Old Testament/Torah stating people who shave should be executed, as one example. There are many degenerative aspects that religions have caused across the world. However, my defense is not in the religion and the ritual, but in the theology and mysticism that man turned into a social construct.

[Rainbow Dash]

*Walks into thread, sees what's going on walks back out*

I thought I was missing something having not been around for a while, same old bandwagons I see.

^

[TVTyrant]

You argue for being able to express yourself however you want, and then you say we should ban religions?

People are weird.

[EX12693]

Religion itself is an ideology, not an expression.

And most often religious are not merely expressed, but also impressed into places where they have no business.

[Bodzilla]

You argue for being able to express yourself however you want, and then you say we should ban religions?

People are weird.
no my point is we shouldnt be teaching kids bullshit and lies, because it's bullshit and lies.

[Warsaw]

You argue for being able to express yourself however you want, and then you say we should ban religions?

People are weird.

I think he's saying that religions shouldn't be taught as if they were somehow the equal of science. One can be proven empirically while the other must be taken on faith, which is the point. I agree, I don't think we should be misleading future generations into believing that dogma is in any way the equivalent of mathematical evidence. Besides, you can believe in the existence of a god or gods without subscribing to particular institutions of that belief or forcing your children to believe as you do.

[TVTyrant]

I think he's saying that religions shouldn't be taught as if they were somehow the equal of science. One can be proven empirically while the other must be taken on faith, which is the point. I agree, I don't think we should be misleading future generations into believing that dogma is in any way the equivalent of mathematical evidence. Besides, you can believe in the existence of a god or gods without subscribing to particular institutions of that belief or forcing your children to believe as you do.
This makes a lot more sense, and I agree with it. I wish I knew more about physics and the scientific theory of the universe, although that is what I mainly subscribe to. Religion isn't something that I base my life or opinions around.

[Cortexian]

I've just always thought that people subscribed to one particular belief or the other because they were scared of death. Pretty much all religions have some version of an "after-life", and I've always thought that people just couldn't accept the fact that life just stops. Therefore they consciously or subconsciously choose to believe in a religion that gives them comfort in the fact that when they die they do not simply cease to exist, but ascend to some better place.

I accepted a long time ago that when I die I'll just stop existing. After that all religions looked silly to me, since all religions are basically just guiding principals on how to gain entry into your version of heaven instead of being condemned to your version of hell.

[TVTyrant]

Once you're dead you're dead. Your body goes in the ground or the ocean or whatever and that's just it. Anyone who doesn't see that as reality is delusional.

[rossmum]

From what little of the video I saw the guy has a pretty ordinary accent for a Londoner so I'm curious as to where "my country" is. Peckham council housing can get pretty out there but I doubt the British Army go in and start beheading people in the parking lot.

Also, humanity as a whole cannot advance until religion is banned from all schools. If you want to believe something, go for it. If you want to tell your children about your beliefs, go for it. Just don't do it with the veneer of legitimacy that is provided by allowing it into the education system, least of all public schools. Just throwing that out there.

e: Also the stupid "fair and balanced" shit needs to die in a fire. It should be illegal to give the same amount of credence to religion as science, presenting it as a viable alternative almost, that is just as "correct". Same goes for medical quackery - trying to "balance" the insane, unfounded bullshit of groups like anti-vaxers and homeopaths with real science should be outlawed.

"Free speech" is a crock of shit, especially since it's not a thing that exists anyway. I would rather have an educated society than one where any malicious stain upon the planet can infect people with their garbage and get away with it since most people are utterly incapable of critical thinking.

e2:


Bod and neuro really have had the short end of the stick when it comes to religion it appears. Not all religious folk and religions are bad.
The delusion that religion is somehow as correct as - or more correct than - scientific fact, despite absolutely no evidence having ever been produced at all from any single religion on the entire planet is conclusive evidence to me that religion is, in fact, inherently not a good thing and a severe retarding force upon the advancement of humanity as a species.

If religion was treated as it should be (some quaint cultural relic from before people knew what the fuck), it'd be fine, because people wouldn't give a shit enough to kill for it and absolutely would not believe it to be an actual correct thing. You can believe in it all you want, but the moment you try and suggest that it even compares to millenia of scientific knowledge, you are lying. There are no two ways about it, that is complete fallacy.


Guys, if you let these assholes ruin your perception of what people are based off of labels to the point of such prejudice/hatred, then you're almost no better than they are in the same sense: just prejudice/ignorant assholes.
I used to (and largely still do) hate militant atheism as much as I hate religious expansionism because they are basically what they hate: preaching their personal system to people regardless of whether it's welcome or not, and willing to force it upon them regardless of what that involves.

On the other hand, they can at least prove their claims. It doesn't make it okay, but it makes it a lot less backwards.


EDIT: For the record Bodz, there is no evidence proving/disproving the existence/nonexistence of a spritual realm/creator.
There is no evidence proving/disproving that this is all a dream and we're actually snails IRL, but I don't go about basing my entire life and world view around that remote possibility.

The fact of the matter is that science proves itself constantly. That's what science does, that's what it is all about. Religion has never proven itself, is physically incapable of being proven by its very nature, and yet insists it is true despite the utter lack of evidence (in fact, in some cases, that in itself is quoted as proof).


You can call me a fuckwit all you want for not being an atheist/agnostic, but the only bullshit being disproven in regards to religion is the radical extremism coming from the same ignorant assholes you and Neuro are raging (rightfully) over.
No, the whole thing is bullshit and it's holding humanity back. The sooner it is faded into the dusty books of irrelevance the better off we will all be. You can believe what you want, but it is completely dishonest to try and claim those beliefs are not the leading cause of pain and suffering throughout human history. I cannot for the life of me figure out why anybody would want to sustain such completely illogical, unprovable belief systems when they are a constant trigger for needless violence and do nothing to improve the world that cannot be done better by non-religious means (religious charities, for example, are no better than non-religious ones - in fact I would argue they are much worse, as they contribute to the further spread of the problem, especially in vulnerable third world countries where people are so desperate and uneducated they will cling to anything).

If you want to believe in something and improve the world, your energy would be better spent trying to make that happen yourself, instead of relying on some invisible sky-man to make it happen after more than 50,000 years of humanity existing and yet that not happening. If it turns out you die and you were right all along, woohoo, good job you. I frankly don't much give a shit what happens after I die, on account of being dead. If I'm missing out on some ballin' after-party for life, so be it.

I used to say fairly neutral on the religion issue and would generally attack both sides equally while keeping my own opinions quiet, but I think I'm done with that. Appeasement is bullshit, religion is bullshit, I am done.

[Warsaw]

Appeasement is, indeed, stupid. Call out bullshit when bullshit is present, just don't go and spread more bullshit. Only empirical data is applicable anywhere, which means that religions should not be taught in schools as anything more than a part social studies academia.

[rossmum]

Yeah - studying it as a social/cultural phenomenon is fine, but teaching religion itself in proper education institutions creates a very dangerous perception that it is factual and of importance in adult life, neither of which are true.

[Bodzilla]

you can teach it for musical reason's, some of the hym's are pretty good.

[Patrickssj6]

Yeah - studying it as a social/cultural phenomenon is fine, but teaching religion itself in proper education institutions creates a very dangerous perception that it is factual and of importance in adult life, neither of which are true.
I went to a catholic school. Religion class, going to church once a month and all that jizz. None of my friends (or me) are religious, I would recommend that school above all the others I went to. We had less of those "usual" school problems.

Also, if you are scientific:There is an area in our brain which serves the sole purpose of spirituality and religion because it does bring progress to humanity, obviously. You are probably missing out on the big picture and focus too much on those moments, when religion did stop revolution (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/De_revolutionibus_orbium_coelestium).

[Warsaw]

I also went to a Catholic school for a time and am not religious. There are indeed good aspects of religion, such as bringing people together to do good works for charity or giving people a reason to keep on going when the going is tough.

[=sw=warlord]

People should come together to work on progress out of their own will not because some divine entity would like them to.

[TVTyrant]

"Free speech" is a crock of shit, especially since it's not a thing that exists anyway. I would rather have an educated society than one where any malicious stain upon the planet can infect people with their garbage and get away with it since most people are utterly incapable of critical thinking.
So long as we agree on this I am fine with it, but for as long as we stand and attempt to fight for free expression I believe we must protect people's right to believe in their God(s).

I agree it shouldn't be taught in schools, other than when it has to do with history (radical Islam, the crusades, the holocaust, Israel-Palestine conflicts). The thing I think is bullshit in the U.S. is that families that want their kids to go to private schools get a subsidy to pay them back for their tax dollars that would otherwise go to public education programs. To me that's a pile of crap. If you want your children to believe in God, teach them yourself and take them to church. But don't make everyone else suffer for it.

I don't believe religion is some evil entity that makes our world awful. Ever watch orangutans or chimps or gorillas? They rape, and kill, and fight all the time, far worse than we do, and they (most likely) have no concept of religion. Nature is violent and chaotic. If anything, religion has lowered the amount of violence in our world by teaching us empathy with other people, simply because our gods are the same. That's a big step.

[TVTyrant]

Appeasement is, indeed, stupid. Call out bullshit when bullshit is present, just don't go and spread more bullshit. Only empirical data is applicable anywhere, which means that religions should not be taught in schools as anything more than a part social studies academia.
Agreed.

[Limited]

I never bothered to check back at this threading, considering usually when I make one no one posts in it. I really wouldnt like this to turn into a religious thread, yes the incident was purely 'political/reglion' based, but I think we can all agree that they are using that as a excuse to kill/chaos havok.

I would like to clear few things up regarding ChemicalFizz's post:

A few bystanders did protect the victim, a women did approach the attackers, gave him an earful and after the incident was over jumped on a bus and went back to work. I think most people's reaction was sheer shock. People have made light in this thread about this kind of thing happens in Muslim countries all the times, perhaps it does, I wouldn't really know. I like to think I live in a civilized country, (minus the idiotic politicians), this kind of thing, when it happens 'on-your-doorstep' is a real eye opener. When things are distant to you in a logical sense, it has less impact.

The police were at the scene within minutes, however the armed response units (guns etc), were not there until 20 minutes. You can understand why the non-armed police didnt want to approach the attackers.

What this incident has highlighted is several major flaws in our intelligence service. They knew of (at least) one of the suspects, they had been investigating him in the past for Islamic fundamentalism and yet they let him slip.

Lastly, one of the attackers has been charged with the murder of the soldier, along with 2 other counts of attempted murder of police officers. This makes it the second man to be charged with the crime.

[rossmum]

People should come together to work on progress out of their own will not because some divine entity would like them to.
Bingo.


So long as we agree on this I am fine with it, but for as long as we stand and attempt to fight for free expression I believe we must protect people's right to believe in their God(s).
I have been getting progressively less and less interested in standing for "free expression" because, quite frankly, it is a load of shit.

You can't freely express yourself, no matter how much you might think otherwise. As soon as you say those magical words, "someone should shoot the president", you're no longer safe. Hate speech is either tolerated - which is abhorrent - or is not tolerated, which clearly means freedom of expression is not a thing. Under freedom of expression, dangerous false information is allowed to be given to those who don't know any better - the sole reason anti-vax groups, "alternative" medicines, and cults still exist.

It's important that people aren't carted off in vans and disappeared simply because they said something their neighbour didn't like, but at the same time, why protect those who use what freedom of expression does exist to spread hatred and misinformation? I certainly don't think we should.


I agree it shouldn't be taught in schools, other than when it has to do with history (radical Islam, the crusades, the holocaust, Israel-Palestine conflicts). The thing I think is bullshit in the U.S. is that families that want their kids to go to private schools get a subsidy to pay them back for their tax dollars that would otherwise go to public education programs. To me that's a pile of crap. If you want your children to believe in God, teach them yourself and take them to church. But don't make everyone else suffer for it.
Private religious schools are a thing here too. I don't know if religion is taught in public schools any longer, but I do know that a lot of the traditional stuff is gone, like easter hat parades.


I don't believe religion is some evil entity that makes our world awful. Ever watch orangutans or chimps or gorillas? They rape, and kill, and fight all the time, far worse than we do, and they (most likely) have no concept of religion. Nature is violent and chaotic.
That doesn't really justify the billions of lives destroyed over thousands of years in the name of imaginary sky people. All crime is awful, but those performed to please some non-existent entity are a special kind of despicable. At least everyone else had some kind of actual reason, no matter how shoddy.


If anything, religion has lowered the amount of violence in our world by teaching us empathy with other people, simply because our gods are the same. That's a big step.
I have empathy with other people because I am a human, I dunno about you. I don't need some archaic bullshit-peddling, money-hoarding institution to tell me that I have invisible friends to do so.

That's another thing. Religion is bad enough, but organised religion is the worst thing. Ever stopped to wonder exactly how much money went into that fancy masonry at your local church or cathedral? The giant stained-glass windows? The ornate garments? The gilded accessories? People (rightly) vilify charities who skim off the top; what of the churches who are by far the worst offenders?

[TVTyrant]

I have empathy with other people because I am a human, I dunno about you. I don't need some archaic bullshit-peddling, money-hoarding institution to tell me that I have invisible friends to do so.
You're also the product of 100,000 years of apes who worshiped the sky people. Empathy has been ingrained in our society by now. My point is that there are now people who, given the murder or wrongly death of a family member, will actually forgive a killer. This is a development of the last 2000 years or so that does not exist in nature. If you've ever seen anything about bears, they go berserk if their cubs are harmed and kill everything they can find. Eagles do the same. As do the great apes. This idea is something based on religion that we have taught ourselves to make society safer. Not saying that it is a necessary thing in modern times (religion I mean), but these kinds of ideas that you yourself have preached were born in religious institutions.

That said, many religious people still don't practice these kinds of ideas, and some would claim that many religious people preach the exact opposite, which is definitely true. You can also look at Jihads and Crusades as examples against it, but that's ignoring what the spread of monotheism did: it got people out of their clan cultures and into the bigger clan of religious entity. Did knights stop butchering each other and women and children because of catholicism? Nope. But at least there was a unit with some kind of power in governance saying "you know guys, you should really stop killing each other, mmmkay?"

[Bodzilla]

thats the worst augmentative point i've ever seen!

thats impressive!

[rossmum]

You're also the product of 100,000 years of apes who worshiped the sky people. Empathy has been ingrained in our society by now.
I have seen some impressively terrible, illogical aruments in my time on the internet, but that is definitely deserving of a top ten spot. Congrats! :ugh:

Empathy is a natural thing, it is not exclusive to humans and it most certainly has nothing to do with religion.


My point is that there are now people who, given the murder or wrongly death of a family member, will actually forgive a killer. This is a development of the last 2000 years or so that does not exist in nature.
False, on both claims. Also, 2,000 years? What, you think post-Christ Christianity specifically had something to do with it? :allears:


If you've ever seen anything about bears, they go berserk if their cubs are harmed and kill everything they can find. Eagles do the same. As do the great apes. This idea is something based on religion that we have taught ourselves to make society safer. Not saying that it is a necessary thing in modern times (religion I mean), but these kinds of ideas that you yourself have preached were born in religious institutions.
No, they weren't. While forgiving behaviour may not be as easily distinguishable in animals, it does happen, and arguing that it is an exclusively human trait - to say nothing of a religiously-derived trait, and a recent one at that - is hilariously ignorant.


That said, many religious people still don't practice these kinds of ideas, and some would claim that many religious people preach the exact opposite, which is definitely true. You can also look at Jihads and Crusades as examples against it, but that's ignoring what the spread of monotheism did: it got people out of their clan cultures and into the bigger clan of religious entity. Did knights stop butchering each other and women and children because of catholicism? Nope. But at least there was a unit with some kind of power in governance saying "you know guys, you should really stop killing each other, mmmkay?"
"At least there was some kind of centralised power" is also a horrible argument, since in nearly every example you just named, that centralised power was the original cause of the bloodshed. Arguing that monotheism is any better or different is stupid, it is the same shit, just a different flavour. It has changed nothing (besides the number of believers per sect and the basic structure of the religion itself). People still kill for it more than anything else.

Sorry, all your arguments sound like ridiculous apologism and not a single one of them actually holds water.

[=sw=warlord]

I'm not sure what's worse, people truly believing humans need religion to possess some form of morality or the idea that some sort of central organization is a good thing?
Some religious folk have some some truly horrific things in the past in the name of religion and still do as do some of those who don't possess religious beliefs.

and as for the idea of a central organization, if everyone was organized by one central authority it would make corruption a hell of a lot more dangerous, look at today's governments, we have governments who use chemical weapons on their own population, governments who use drone strikes on supposed suspects without any care for due process.

How much worse do you honestly think it would be if there was a omnipotent, omnipresent central government, worse yet, in the name of one religion or another.
A central organization which would have the might of the worlds technological resources.
Oh wait, we don't need to imagine, we already see different aspects of this with the worlds various organizations now.

:mech3:

[Bodzilla]

aint the future grand

[TVTyrant]

If another person thinks I'm making an argument for why we "herp derp still need religion", I'll stop.

My point was that from a historical perspective, we wouldn't have gotten to this point culturally without it, and part of the practice was the new idea of "hey, let's not slaughter those guys since they're the same religion as us."

I can't play both sides of the coin guys. I was offering a perspective which apparently you did not enjoy. That's fine. But I'm just saying there's a sociological side to it that you're choosing to not see.

On centralized power: Pope ordained kings, lords oaths to kings, minor lords swore oaths to lords, serfs were the properties of the lands that the lords possessed. The pope usually didn't like it when the kingdoms of Christendom fought each other.

On empathy: Ross, I'm sorry man but it's all in there. Go read some mythology. There's a dramatic shift in tone after the foundation of Christianity. Not saying that it had all that much bearing on the actual actions of people, but I'm just saying it's a new idea. The Greeks certainly didn't believe in forgiveness. The Romans didn't either. The Norse definitely didn't (except for Thor). In what little time I've spent on Hinduism I've never seen that attitude expressed. Shinto is as bad as the Norse religion.

Modern sociologists view the monotheistic religions as a movement that opened the circle of who people thought should be treated as equals. Before the big 5 (yes Hinduism still counts and in some way breaks the idea), the multitude of Gods and religions is seen as one of the pre-eminent causes of conflict. This has since been condensed into 5 main religions, and while I agree wholeheartedly that religion is still a major cause of conflict throughout the world, it can be objectively stated that the modern system is better than the old one was.

Again though, I'm arguing a side of the coin. This is all crap I was taught in college, so whatevs picks at that if you want. It's an argument that can be made so I'm making it for the purpose of discussion.

[Bodzilla]

IUttbZcv7WI&autoplay=1

[rossmum]

If another person thinks I'm making an argument for why we "herp derp still need religion", I'll stop.
Why? It's basically what your post amounted to.


My point was that from a historical perspective, we wouldn't have gotten to this point culturally without it, and part of the practice was the new idea of "hey, let's not slaughter those guys since they're the same religion as us."
[citation needed]

Seriously, that's crap and you have to know it. There's no way you can make sweeping statements about whether we'd still be living in caves or not without religion (and we pretty objectively would not).


I can't play both sides of the coin guys. I was offering a perspective which apparently you did not enjoy. That's fine. But I'm just saying there's a sociological side to it that you're choosing to not see.
You offered a perspective based on nothing but sheer conjecture (all of which was wrong), which is why we "chose" not to see it. I don't go out of my way to subject myself to that kind of thing, or I'd spend a lot more time on sites extolling the need to avoid chemtrails.


On centralized power: Pope ordained kings, lords oaths to kings, minor lords swore oaths to lords, serfs were the properties of the lands that the lords possessed. The pope usually didn't like it when the kingdoms of Christendom fought each other.
Wrong, wrong, wrong. The Pope was perfectly fine with Christians killing each other, as long as the ones being killed were Protestants or other "undesireables" the Catholic Church didn't get along with. He was also fine with people of other religions (most commonly, Muslims and Jews) or pagans/agnostics/atheists (where they still existed, since they'd been the target of assimilation and extermination for centuries already) being tortured, killed, and forcibly converted in their hundreds of thousands, possibly millions.

Also, Feudalism is abhorrent, and having a religious authority that makes up rules to ensure the steady subservience of its followers and the steady flow of cash into its coffers heading such a system is even worse. That you seem to think it in some way helped further humanity is astounding.


On empathy: Ross, I'm sorry man but it's all in there. Go read some mythology. There's a dramatic shift in tone after the foundation of Christianity. Not saying that it had all that much bearing on the actual actions of people, but I'm just saying it's a new idea. The Greeks certainly didn't believe in forgiveness. The Romans didn't either. The Norse definitely didn't (except for Thor). In what little time I've spent on Hinduism I've never seen that attitude expressed. Shinto is as bad as the Norse religion.
Hmmm yes because it's impossible to behave a certain way unless the predominant belief system of the era expressly condones it yes siree :lolugh:

I'm done. Believe whatever you want to believe, I'll be over in the corner for people whose perspectives aren't clouded by some bizarre subconscious need to try and make excuses for the most damaging and backwards institutions in human history.


Modern sociologists view the monotheistic religions as a movement that opened the circle of who people thought should be treated as equals. Before the big 5 (yes Hinduism still counts and in some way breaks the idea), the multitude of Gods and religions is seen as one of the pre-eminent causes of conflict. This has since been condensed into 5 main religions, and while I agree wholeheartedly that religion is still a major cause of conflict throughout the world, it can be objectively stated that the modern system is better than the old one was.
Objectively stated, huh? You were there, were you?

Different cultures have very different opinions of what is "objectively" better, and insofar as that goes, I put absolutely no faith in any sociologist who attempts to tell me that the modern monotheistic religions their society JUST SO HAPPENS to follow were some magical shining light that brought humanity to greatness.


Again though, I'm arguing a side of the coin. This is all crap I was taught in college, so whatevs picks at that if you want. It's an argument that can be made so I'm making it for the purpose of discussion.
You know what else they teach people in many colleges? That an unrestrained free market is an objectively good thing and solves every problem ever. Get this: college doesn't teach you what is correct, it teaches you what is considered 'true' in your society for the purposes of best operating within that environment.

[DarkHalo003]

@Rossmum: just skimming by, I simply want to iterate that my post from earlier wasn't defending religion so much as it's defending the non-fucked up people in religion who don't shove their beliefs on others. As far as science constantly proving itself, you are correct of course, but my point is as simple as probability. Theology may or may not be true, even if evidence is not readily available like it is for science. I'm simply defending all of the people who aren't mass murdering for their religion or any cause for that matter.


People should come together to work on progress out of their own will not because some divine entity would like them to.
It's funny that you say this because most deities or prophets in religious texts are trying to promote this exact concept. You know, "love your neighbor as thyself" etc. You think that after 2000+ years....

[Bodzilla]

theres nothing bad about having peaceful quiet religious people... except that they're categorically wrong, and teach their children their factually incorrect beliefs..
oh wait thats kinda bad too, i guess the only logical thing is to teach and learn based on the evidence we have at hand the most factually correct statements our place in time can give them.

People dont need this voodoo nonsense, especially that with a little education (which is never a bad thing) people can see the beauty and remarkable nature of the universe around us.

For instance:
I learnt today that if you had a bathtub big enough to put the planet saturn in, it would float on the water like a rubber ducky.
thats cool.

[TVTyrant]

Why? It's basically what your post amounted to.
I never stated that and you know it. I'm not religious, I'm just not a fan of people putting down others for their beliefs, even if their beliefs are admittedly founded on nothing. But I know lots of religious people who are well educated, or work as engineers. Believing in Sky Man doesn't make you stupid, and it doesn't make you worth less than other people either.


[citation needed]

Seriously, that's crap and you have to know it. There's no way you can make sweeping statements about whether we'd still be living in caves or not without religion (and we pretty objectively would not).
I said nothing about "caves". I said mass fucking murder on the grandest scale. Part of the history of Rome is how they viewed the barbarians (aka Germans) as sub-human for a thousand years. They displaced people, breaking up tribal living styles through slaughter and enslavement. Meanwhile in Persia, the monotheistic followers of zoroastrianism had already built a stable government that would outlast Rome based on tolerance. Holy fuck what a fucking thought, that people are, you know, people. And why did they believe this? The progress of religion of course. Because before you have science, you have to have fucking something.


You offered a perspective based on nothing but sheer conjecture (all of which was wrong), which is why we "chose" not to see it. I don't go out of my way to subject myself to that kind of thing, or I'd spend a lot more time on sites extolling the need to avoid chemtrails.
Welcome to the world of history Ross. Where everything is conjecture, and evidence doesn't really matter.


Wrong, wrong, wrong. The Pope was perfectly fine with Christians killing each other, as long as the ones being killed were Protestants or other "undesireables" the Catholic Church didn't get along with. He was also fine with people of other religions (most commonly, Muslims and Jews) or pagans/agnostics/atheists (where they still existed, since they'd been the target of assimilation and extermination for centuries already) being tortured, killed, and forcibly converted in their hundreds of thousands, possibly millions.
King John, and Frederick Barbarossa (although there were other reasons) were both excommunicated for waging war on fellow Catholics. King Andrew of Hungary was excommunicated because he wouldn't follow a bill of rights. Oh man, the pope's so fucking awful dawg, upholding people's rights. That's fucking terrible what a travesty.


Also, Feudalism is abhorrent, and having a religious authority that makes up rules to ensure the steady subservience of its followers and the steady flow of cash into its coffers heading such a system is even worse. That you seem to think it in some way helped further humanity is astounding.
Feudalism was the only way to achieve any measure of peace in a time of constant conflict. Rule by the Cruel was the other option, which was barely different but still far worse. I'd take Feudalism over no governance any day, thanks.
If it weren't for that awful religious authority founding nine tenths of the universities in Europe, the whole thing would have continued to decline. It was only because of Charlemagne that we were able to preserve any knowledge at all.


Hmmm yes because it's impossible to behave a certain way unless the predominant belief system of the era expressly condones it yes siree

I'm done. Believe whatever you want to believe, I'll be over in the corner for people whose perspectives aren't clouded by some bizarre subconscious need to try and make excuses for the most damaging and backwards institutions in human history.
After this post, as am I. You're too clouded by some sense of rage and hatred to see history clearly. The Dark Age didn't end itself.



Objectively stated, huh? You were there, were you?
This shit flys both ways, and I don't feel like I need to make an argument other than this: Life expectancy higher, rate of violence lower, overall quality of life higher, across the fucking board. We don't have to worry about famines in the U.S., U.K., or Australia. We don't worry about plagues. We don't worry about people rowing ships into our countries and thrashing up towns for the gold and then sailing away.


You know what else they teach people in many colleges? That an unrestrained free market is an objectively good thing and solves every problem ever. Get this: college doesn't teach you what is correct, it teaches you what is considered 'true' in your society for the purposes of best operating within that environment.
Again, part of what I'm doing is arguing a side. But I've literally never been taught that the free market is a good thing. Not once. Maybe it's because my father's dislike of wealthy people was so effectively drilled into me growing up, or because of the current state of our "free market (i.e. heavily subsidized) venture capitalist economy", but I've never been told by anyone in a school setting that it was a good thing. I've had regular people argue that it is, but they mostly have no idea what the fuck they're talking about, or they're rich anyways and that's why they believe such things.

[TVTyrant]

I learnt today that if you had a bathtub big enough to put the planet saturn in, it would float on the water like a rubber ducky.
thats cool.
That's actually really fucking cool.

[Roostervier]

Wasn't that kind of obvious? Considering it's made up of a mixture of gases, and gases are less dense than water, it's only natural that it would "float". :V

[Patrickssj6]

Wasn't that kind of obvious? Considering it's made up of a mixture of gases, and gases are less dense than water, it's only natural that it would "float". :V
Same thought

[Bodzilla]

it's the only one in the solar system that would, so no not really.

[=sw=warlord]

It should be pretty obvious, especially given gravity is relative to the mass and density of the object exerting said gravity.
More dense and more mass an object has, the strong it's pull, so if you sat a bath on earth and tried floating a planet in said bath you'd find the gravity from the planet trying to pull it "down".

[rossmum]

I'm not religious, I'm just not a fan of people putting down others for their beliefs, even if their beliefs are admittedly founded on nothing.
So if you knew someone who believed that 1+1=5.492, and told everyone they met this, and taught their children that it was undeniable truth, you would just let them because fucking with peoples' beliefs is haraam? If someone told you they believe a certain group of people are all thieves, would you not tell them otherwise or call them out for being a piece of shit?

Sounds like there's a lot of expecting to have cake and eat it going on here.


But I know lots of religious people who are well educated, or work as engineers. Believing in Sky Man doesn't make you stupid, and it doesn't make you worth less than other people either.
I know a lot of atheists who are complete fucking retards, adhering to the only truth that we can prove doesn't make you automatically intelligent. What is this completely irrelevant anecdote supposed to prove, exactly? I don't recall calling all religious people stupid, nor do I recall saying they are inferior to atheists. I do recall saying that religion is backwards. This may come as a shock to you, but belief or lack thereof in backwards falsehoods does not necessarily have an overriding effect on your own nature.


I said nothing about "caves". I said mass fucking murder on the grandest scale.
You know perfectly well what I meant, don't start splitting hairs over semantics. It's fucking petty and it is never, ever a substitute for an actual argument, no matter how much people on this site might wish it was.

Also I hate to break it to you but every mass murder on the grandest scale I can think of offhand prior to the 20th century was done either partly or wholly for religious reasons. In fact, so were many recent ones.


Part of the history of Rome is how they viewed the barbarians (aka Germans) as sub-human for a thousand years. They displaced people, breaking up tribal living styles through slaughter and enslavement. Meanwhile in Persia, the monotheistic followers of zoroastrianism had already built a stable government that would outlast Rome based on tolerance. Holy fuck what a fucking thought, that people are, you know, people. And why did they believe this? The progress of religion of course. Because before you have science, you have to have fucking something.
Yes, let's conveniently ignore the part where Rome eventually adopted a monotheistic religion themselves and still went right along murdering and pillaging and enslaving. Let's ignore the entire fucking history of the British Empire. Holy fuck, this isn't even an argument, it's just drivel.


Welcome to the world of history Ross. Where everything is conjecture, and evidence doesn't really matter.
No, I don't think you know how history works. That is not history, that is bullshit. History is based on a constant process of evidence-based theory, drawing from as many sources as possible to try and establish the closest approximation of the actual truth as possible. It is a long, messy, ongoing process, but it is very much about evidence and the entire fucking goal is to establish the truth, not some fucking subjective horseshit based on personal politics.

Really, that is just fucking insulting.


King John, and Frederick Barbarossa (although there were other reasons) were both excommunicated for waging war on fellow Catholics. King Andrew of Hungary was excommunicated because he wouldn't follow a bill of rights. Oh man, the pope's so fucking awful dawg, upholding people's rights. That's fucking terrible what a travesty.
Yes, let's just conveniently ignore the Spanish Inquisition, Ireland's entire recent history, the constant wars between Catholics and Protestants in England and Scotland, the Crusades, and the policies set by the stinking rich, politically powerful Catholic Church, many of which still stand to this day and are only slightly less abhorrent now for the sake of preventing mass uproar.

Again, fucking insulting. I would consider your apologism for one of the most wretched, murderous institutions in recorded European history here to be little better than that of the kinds of fucking retards who argue the CSA were angels and slavery was okay because STATES' RIGHTS were being upheld and that is all that matters.

I am legitimately fucking mad now, this is disgusting and I hope you eventually realise just how ashamed you ought to be handwaving so many fucking atrocities with the excuse that "oh well if Catholic monarchs fought each other sometimes the Church would stop them".


Feudalism was the only way to achieve any measure of peace in a time of constant conflict. Rule by the Cruel was the other option, which was barely different but still far worse. I'd take Feudalism over no governance any day, thanks.
This is another load of apologist horseshit, please stay away from history and politics and leave them to those of us who know what we're talking about thanks in advance


If it weren't for that awful religious authority founding nine tenths of the universities in Europe, the whole thing would have continued to decline. It was only because of Charlemagne that we were able to preserve any knowledge at all.
Ah yes, I see, all is absolved because of the above and because of the establishment of universities*

*which still fell under the gaze of the Church so good luck trying to push any line of study that they didn't agree with


After this post, as am I. You're too clouded by some sense of rage and hatred to see history clearly. The Dark Age didn't end itself.
Take a wild fucking guess what one of the major contributors that kept it going for so long happened to be!


This shit flys both ways, and I don't feel like I need to make an argument other than this: Life expectancy higher, rate of violence lower, overall quality of life higher, across the fucking board. We don't have to worry about famines in the U.S., U.K., or Australia. We don't worry about plagues. We don't worry about people rowing ships into our countries and thrashing up towns for the gold and then sailing away.
That has nothing to do with religion (especially since the US has such a laughably high rate of belief compared to the UK or Australia it's not even funny, and that doesn't even begin to account for the percentage within those who consider themselves religious who actually give a shit about going to church or doing those other religious things that aren't praying only when you're in deep shit or using the names of religious figures as curses). Intellectual dishonesty, apologism and whitewashing of crimes against humanity, complete and utter lack of the historical process, this post has it all!

Fuck this site, if this is the kind of shit I can expect from it then I don't know why I'm stupid enough to keep coming back.

[TVTyrant]

Fuck this site, if this is the kind of shit I can expect from it then I don't know why I'm stupid enough to keep coming back.
Because you love us (especially me) and it's fun to get mad?

[rossmum]

It's not fun to get mad actually, it used to be but now it's just infuriating

Also there's a difference between "mad at bad arguments" and "mad at offensive arguments"

[TVTyrant]

It's not fun to get mad actually, it used to be but now it's just infuriating

Also there's a difference between "mad at bad arguments" and "mad at offensive arguments"
Ross, you know I love you man. All that matters is the way we feel towards each other.

[Warsaw]

Don't get mad, get glad!

:mech2:

[rossmum]

Don't get mad, get glad!

:mech2:
leave this place (http://www.modacity.net/forums/showthread.php?25169-Smile-or-Die)