I am back and disappointed

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HelgeS

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Hello Ladies and Gentlemen,

I am deeply disappointed. There I am, venturing as an open minded person into this discussion group, ready to enjoy a challenging discussion with equally challenging minds. Instead, I have to realise that only an incredibly small part of the persons posting here seems to be capable of presenting a coherent and challenging argument. I thank the gentlemen who actually followed my request and emailed me his response. A nicely formulated, thought through and well received response I might add, despite a difference in opinion. I did a large part of my academic work in philosophy and physics, both made me enjoy intelligent conversation. What I do not enjoy is the stuff I had to read here. It is not only insult, it is also undermining the position of the intelligent supporters of the pro gun movement.

Let me very quickly go over a few of the balantly obvious points (I won't bother loosing time over the simply minded insults I received, just about the ones that made me laugh):

- "I want people to email me so that i can get their IP and report them"

That one is cute - and a display of a naive simpleton mind. If you check out the email address then you will notice that it is a university account. Due to the IT policies of this university (and pretty much any other larger institution in north america), IP tracing is not allowed or offered. That is, I have no direct way of getting your IP address. On the other hand, this forum logs your IP with every post. It even says so straight in the policies. That means, each time you post something unpleasent all I need to do is to copy the post in the little complaint box of the webboard provider and they do all the work (informing the ISP, etc). Folks, that one was really cute :)

- "I am a socialist" / "I am a Nazi"
Hmm... I presume Political Science is not a very populare subject among the members of this forum. How can I be a socialist and a Nazi at the same time? A socialist because I have a different opinion, a Nazi because of my place of birth. Amazing how simple it is to put all those glorified statements about freedom of speech, equality of all races, etc aside and then stereotype so quickly (and wrongly). The statements would even be a bit insulting if it weren't for the absolute logical error that just, again, displays the simpleton and not much else.
I can assure you, I was born in the western part of Germany. I am also not a particularly strong believer in the socialist movement, counting myself (and voting as one) more a social-democrat. I did extensively study most publications of Marx, Engels and Lenin though. But then, I studied the bible, the koran, the thora and confuszious with equal feriousity when it came to picking a religion. Lack of knowledge (of your own and your opposite opinion) is never a good thing. Reading a grade 8 school text about major political movements would have certainly prevented the Nazi/Socialist blunder.

Neither am I a Nazi. Yes, I was born in Germany, a country with a rich history full of good and evil. (By the way, just for the numerical reference here, the attempted genocide during WWII is not even in the top ten in the human history. The top place is currently held by the genocide of the native americans, followed closely by the suppression genocide under Kublei Khan. That doesn't excuse the work of the Nazi's at all, but it might open some eyes. It is always easy to put accusing fingers against a loser. We humans have a weakness for this move.)
My grandfather was part of the general staff in charge of the eastern front in WWII. In 1943 he joint the conspirators known as the Kreisauer Kreis who then in 1944 made the biggest effort (out of over 40) to kill Hitler and take over the country. For 36 hours after the explosion he held command over several divisions in the east securing most of rumania and slowakia in revolt to hitler, assuming that the coup d'etat had succeeded and that he was soon to be informed by the new reichskanzler to had over most of the area to liberty and accept a cease fire form the russian high command. Instead he received the order to appear before the surviving Hitler and was (like most of the other conspirators) hung on pig hooks for display.
My other grandfather served as chief engineer under Werner von Braun, building the V1, the V2 and the Heinkel 111, raining destruction over England and France. He never attempted to stop any of the political events.
My father never saw his father in his entire life. My mother first saw her father when he was released from Sibiria after 9 years in 1954.
Do I value the revolutionary grandfather more than the engineer? No, certainly not. Both acted according to their moral principles, both acted like people would act if tomorrow the US would start a dictatorship.
I have no reason to feel any love for the Nazi movement. I published several articles and a book and the socio-political issues of WWII, I did an entire degree in history just on that issue. I have led a large variety of anti-nazi movements, nationally and internationally, against such political movements. I am currently the head of the MENSA political discussion group. Calling me a Nazi is like calling Hitler a liberalist. Too stupid to be taken as an insult and too simple minded to provide a good laugh.

- I have to admit that this whole Nazi story really caught my attention. Just ask yourself some questions and answer honestly if you still can with that cloud of irrational hatred in your mind:

* If a democratically elected "Hitler" gains power over the US tomorrow, what would you (you, the person, not the collective) do?

* If the US would lie surrounded on all sides by powerful nations with whom it had millinia's of conflicts, how many world war would it have started?

* If I would be from say Mexico, would you tie my anti gun statement together with a direct accusation of being a murderer since mexico saw the slaughter of millions of natives by the conquistatores?

* What if I were an american? Would you accuse me of being a murderer since the US saw the greatest genocides of all times, saw the invention and first and only use of the greatest mass destruction weapon of all times?

- Let's press the finger on the right point here:

I over you coherent and polite arguments against your case. What do i get in return?

* Insults that do nothing by undermine your own position due to their ridiculous composition

* Threats, actual threats (that was really annoying. The last time i heard that "come and fight like a man if you dare" nonsense was in grade 5 or so. Over the internet it sounds even more ridiculous.) I would truly appreciate if you could refrain from utter those things again. We all know that nobody here really itches to get charged for threat of assault, something that is taken very serious nowadays by the police. But apart from that, you really don't do your intelligent supporters of the pro gun movement any good since you just present the public with more examples of the "stupid gun owner who falls back to aggression as soon as his/her simple mind runs out of arguments".

For me these answers were annoying, for you they were embarrassing and for the intelligent supporters of your cause they were harmful. Has any good been done?

cheers

Helge
 
Just found the other thread and read some more.

Panzerfuehrer, es ist wahrlich eine Freunde jemanden hier zu finden der in der Lage ist zwischen logischem Argument und dummen Beleidigungen zu differenzieren. Gratulation.

The new threat opened even more intersting fields. Isn't it amazing that so far nobody but the gentlemen who wrote me an email actually fairly and politely commented on my questions and arguments? Instead, there are almost a hundred posts bickering about German history. The word german in my initial post felt only in the short introduction. Now, how is it that simply my place of birth triggers such an enormous outbreak of primitive rage? I have been born in Germany, yet, I have lived in 17 other countries so far. I am in love with foreign cultures. I am as much German as I am French, Russian, Polish, Isreali, Indian, Canadian, ..., and, yes, american. I lived in all these places, learned their language and tried to absorb as much as possible of their culture. I can only recommend it, it opens ones mind and certainly would save many of you the embarrassment resulting from the utter of the nonsense displayed here.

Given the recent thread, let me ask a few more questions:

- somebody gloriously talked of "the many veterans of WWII on this board". I almost felt laughing from my chair. They are probably outnumbered by the veterans of the 100 year war... Just for the historically challenged among us. WWII ended 55 years ago. That would make veterans approach the 80. How many people of that age are among us today? In fact, with all that talk about "US saving the world form Nazi Germany", how many people here have actually done ANYTHING to save ANYBODY? How many people here have offered their lives trying to restore order in blood-mad countries? How many people have participated in any kind of peace keeping operation, war, disaster response operation, medical support operation, etc? How many. Would you please lift your hands ladies and gentlemen?

Ladies and Gentlemen, please, let the people among you with the ability to argue in a polite way, with wit and intelligent, do the work here. For all you others merely harm their work. If Isaac Newton would have his principia read out by stupid rabble then we would still live without mechanics. The same will hold for the gun movement.

cheers

Helge
 
HelgeS you post a very valid point. I don't post on this board very ofetn for two reasons, the quality of the responses and the format of the board. I find thes format difficullt to use and impossibe to maintain a discussion. It is only a commentary board. So you were correct in asking for an e-mail response.
There is nothing wrong with Political Science. Ridicule only comes from those to uninformed to understand the true meaning of the term.
Ken

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Helge, this is the first I have seen of you on this forum. Welcome. I would comment on what you said about socialism/nazism. Nazi is short for National Socialist German Workers Party. Nazism was a totalitarian nationalist alternative to totalitarian international socialism. Hitler and all his top lieutenants were hard-core socialists who hated everything about the old Europe. They talked constantly of proletarian revolution that would destroy the bourqeois class. "The Post WW II germans joked that the only thing the East Germans changed when they became communists was the color of their uniform." I am not knowledgeable in this field and learned this from Gene Ed. Veith. He writes for World Magazine. I tried to find the article he wrote at their site but did not. Maybe you can.
I found a book that Veith wrote that touches on this subject. Here is a review on Amazon.com: The New Pagans- Veith exposes the real fascism today. March 20, 1999

Reviewer: hgb3@juno.com from Fairhope, Alabama
Prof. Gene Edward Veith, a Lutheran professor of English at Concordia Univ. in Wisconsin, if anything else, has taken a word which has come to be used as a contentless, empty and generalized "catch-all" insult, and has attempted to remind a historically ignorant generation of what "fascism" was really all about in the 1930's and 1940's and from whom, whence, and what sources this terrible political and philosophical system was derived, the form it took then, and the form it takes today.
First of all, Veith has a smiling Ezra Pound on the cover giving the fascist salute in 1958. This picture is not meant to cleverly provoke, but to show, as is detailed in the chapter, "The Beautiful Ideas Which Kill", that in his allegiance to fascism, Pound and some of his artistic and intellectual allies, Imagist poet T.E. Hulme, George Bernard Shaw, and the pre-war Wyndham Lewis, found the political vehicle of fascism (to them at least) a very logical outgrowth of their theories and views of art and life. The celebration of "the primitive", the concrete over the abstract, and overall contempt for the "bourgeois, moderate, classical..."(quoting from Thomas Mann), in favor of the Nietzchean and Dionysean unrestraint represent not any kind of a current "conformity" to classical and historical traditions but at the time, the very "avant-garde" throwing off of all such shackle.

There are many such illustrations of the sort, which Veith uses not for purpose of mere "high-brow" name-dropping or ad hominem indictment, but for the deeper meaning of the book itself: Fascism has always been on the cutting edge, and the people who first loved and propagandized it were not bourgeois businessmen in suits, but the writers, artists, poets, and philosophers. It is important to realize that one reason that the Jewish people were singled out for castigation was that they represented a transcendent intellectual order, anti-paganism and moralism. Although it has become a matter of cliche, Frederich Nietzche really did popularize many of these ideas in works such as "The Will to Power", where Judaism and Christianity were systems of weakness and artificial supports for weaknesses in their hindrance of man's primordial will and drive to power and action.

"Modern Fascism" covers eugenics, abortion, political ideology, and religion in addition to the artistic and philosophical aspects of fascism, marking his obvious subject: the National Socialist state of Hitler's Germany. Veith offers disparate examples of how history has been revised and ignored to the absurd point that "fascism" is now considered somehow "conservative", and the opposite of the Left. Actually, the extreme Right and the extreme Left are two competing sides of the same fascistic coin (i.e. National Socialism (Nazism) and International Socialism (Marxism). Veith also debunks (as have numerous others) the pernacious myth that Nazism was somehow Christian. The truth is that Hitler perverted and used "God-words" for his own end, and eventually dropped them altogether once complete power was gained. The German Protestant Church had become so weakened by liberalism and humanistic thought, that it was powerless to resist. True Christians such as Dietrich Bonhoeffer were executed.

Finally, one of the most interesting and frightening sections is the end where Veith links much of modern 1990's culture in America with the very same fascism it falsely purports to hate. The very modern return to paganism and Gnostic/New Age type religions (in a friendly face) and the celebration of the violent, arrogant, and unrestrained raw sexuality in film, television, literature, and music is indeed very close to the old fascism in truth no matter how many "anti-Fascist messages" are attempted. The popular culture and modern media which was used by the Nazis (Leni Reifenstahl's use of cinema, the mass rally, etc.) to pound home their message also sounds current. Veith also reminds us that the Nazis were supreme environmentalists, criticizing the mercantile and urban Jews for creating "alienation" between man and nature.

There is a very real problem with skinheads and white racist and anti-Semitic groups of hooligans in both the U.S. and Europe. But there is also a much more subtle and less overt form of it in the academic community where political correctness is enforced and books are not burned, but "deconstructed." At the very least, the modern academic community which immerses itself in this nonsense will have no ground nor the tools to fight fascism if it ever comes here politically, with power to be enforced. At the worst, they are collaborators with it. Professor Veith is sure to be criticized by those who are convinced that Fascism consists solely of either grainy, black & white newsreels of goose-stepping German officers or all people who want to "impose their morality" on others, but I believe he is prescient and absolutely correct in his general thesis that modern Fascism is ultimately paganism in modern dress. Veith's final sentence encapsulates the book: "Fascism is the modern world's nostalgia for paganism. It is a sophisticated culture's revolt against God."

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0570046033/qid=963750882/sr=1-20/104-1680310-5534303

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Alexander Solzhenitzyn:
"Freedom is given to the human conditionally, in the assumption of his constant religious responsibility."

[This message has been edited by Keiller TN (edited July 16, 2000).]
 
Helge, it's certainly true that SOME parts of Europe, SOME of the time, enjoy lower rates of violence than we have experienced lately on average in the U.S... Keeping in mind that we're talking about an average, and that most of the U.S. enjoys fairly low rates of violent crime. It's also true that, over the last hundred years, FAR more Europeans have died violent deaths than Americans, both in absolute and per-capita terms. Until you've demonstrated an ability to go more than 50 years without plunging into a bloodbath of ultra-violence, (The Balkans ARE part of Europe, aren't they?) you've got little standing to lecture US about violence.


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Sic semper tyrannis!
 
HelgeS, are you saying that the US goverment killed more Indians than the Nazi's killed Jews and others?
 
<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by JHS:
HelgeS, are you saying that the US goverment killed more Indians than the Nazi's killed Jews and others?[/quote]


I've read estimates that they estimate there were fewer than 900,000 Indians in North American When the Settlers came here. More probable died from the Diseases Europeans brought than from being shot or murdered. I find those estimates believable because there weren't any Cities with 100,000 natives living here. The Indians seemed to be more Nomads than Thriving Societies. Farther South in Mexico YES but not in North America. Anyone that knows there history knows Stalin killed more people than the Germans did. I do believe that most people think the only Genocide in history was the Nazi extermination of the Jews. Its modern education and Jewish influence in the Media.
 
Yes, your back. But back from what? The first time around it was heir Coinneach who put your message on the thread. We were also warned that we should not try to ring your bell as if your are someone very special. The way your two part come back reads...and my German is a little rusty...you were getting a few licks of your own in on us lowly wonderkind of pro gun people. However, I did get the jest of your congratualtory remarks to Heir Panzerfuehrer, and this does not lead credence to your validity of all you have stated. Your statements or typical eletist socialist rhetoric, the very highly holy than thow because I am of a super smart German intelect. While we poor dummen slobs are not worthy to make any disapproving comments concerning panzerfuehrer or yourself. There is no argument with your kind, nor any worthy discussion that is profitable. Having said that I probably won't even make it on this post as the board moderators will give me the heave-ho. But that is the American way, here today gone today.
 
Helge, es freut mich sehr!

Helge makes a number of valid points regarding genocide, from which virtually no group has clean hands - I can think of at least a half-dozen more examples off the top of my head. But, Folks, this is not about Nazis and who killed whom or how many. The topic is gun control.

In order to get back on track, my feelings are that responsible ownership of firearms is a good thing. Here in Vermont (just can't resist bringing that up :D), we have the least restrictive firearms laws in the US. We also have one of, if not the lowest incidence of firearms-related crime.

Except for the People's Republic of Burlington, we are primarily an agricultural state. The rural folks know the value of firearms, and also the responsible use of them; this has not changed for over 200 years. I carry on a daily basis, and in all the many years I have done so, have never needed to even draw my weapon.

My feeling is the more one tries to legislate an issue, the more confusing it becomes.

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Panzerführer

Die Wahrheit ist eine Perle. Werfen sie nicht vor die Säue.

Those that beat their swords into plowshares will plow for those that don't.
 
Hey Helga,

The Europeans who are anti-gun are usually those whose ass we kicked or whose ass we saved. I'm not polite to overbearing European snobs of dubious heritage. Sorry, but the only good thing about Germany is seeing the wreckage from American bombers. And maybe your beer.

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"Vote with a Bullet."
 
Keiller...interesting and informative post. Would that I were so articulate and organized.

Helge...It is not that difficult to obtain the address of an ISP from ANY online computer. There is no secure communication via the web; nor via telephone or radio transmission.

Yes, world war two ended 55 years ago. To you that may be ancient history. To me it was a long time ago but I can remember well some of the highlights (and lows) of that war. Some of my friends and kin did not survive that war. In 39 I had half a dozen male cousins, in 45 I had one.

You ask: "How many people here have offered their lives trying to restore order in blood-mad countries?" I, for one, raise my hand. I have spent a total of 50 months on the line, either under fire or threat of fire. This in an assortment of countries over a prolonged period of time. Each time resisting the bloody domination of people who were being trampled by socialism.

I am not alone in daily life or on these boards. You are young and impressed with the idea of saving the world by making it One World of like thinkers, much like an ant colony. The Queen ant lives well at the expense of her serfs.

On the other hand, I am old. I have long believed in the pure concept of a Constitutional Republic, wherein the government is severely restricted and controlled by the free people of that Republic. We have strayed from that principle for over a hundred years with the invasion of socialism and big government. But I still believe that the American system is salvageable.

The issue of uninfringed arms ownership is not the only issue; but it is a key issue. If the free Citizens are disarmed, then they have no means with which to keep their government in check.

Regards

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Sam I am, grn egs n packin

Nikita Khrushchev predicted confidently in a speech in Bucharest, Rumania on June 19, 1962 that: " The United States will eventually fly the Communist Red Flag...the American people will hoist it themselves."
 
Helge;
I will not flame you or anything else.I simply do not like you or your attude.
Bob

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Age and deceit will overcome youth and speed.
I'm old and deceitful.
 
Why do you guys bother arguing with this person?

If you're of European heritage, then your ancestors came over here to escape mindsets like that.

This dialogue is pointless.

I'll pick up this discussion a few years from now when he comes back crying for us to protect him, again, from the Russian bear's embrace.

Oh, BTW, here's just a snippet from an LA Times article about those sophisticated Europeans.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nation/updates/lat_neonazi000716.htm

"Germany Faces a Rising Tide of Intolerance
Europe: Neo-Nazis are rallying in the east, where Communist ideals, identity collapsed after reunification."

. . .

"Ever since local thugs drove an Algerian asylum-seeker through a glass door last year and drank beer while he slowly bled to death in the stairwell, Guben has become the rallying point for fascist rabble and the focus of much soul-searching about disaffected youth and dysfunctional families."

Click on the URL for the full story of these "enlightened" people.

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The New World Order has a Third Reich odor.


[This message has been edited by Oatka (edited July 16, 2000).]
 
Dag nab it, I'm out of here too, where the heck is Munchun land and the yellow brick road. The wizard will tell us what to do.

Jim
 
HelgeS, I'm disappointed you're on this forum too. You want to talk about Nazis, how about the words elitism and arrogance? That pretty much sums up your post for me.

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"Gun Control is Only to Protect Those in Power"
 
Americans have the right and advantage of being armed - unlike the citizens of other countries whose governments are afraid to trust the people with arms. ~~ James Madison, The Federalist Papers No. 46 at 243-244.

I visit this forum for serious relaxation and expect to find all manner of individuals with opinions. If I want SERIOUS I'll walk to the office and go back to work. I have been providing vocational rehabilitation services to individuals with disabilities for 26 years since getting my M.S. in counseling at age 23 and have seen enough pain and suffering(and courage and success!) without feeling the need to volunteer overseas.
FWIW, I studied physics at the undergraduate level, but found that working with individuals to help them solve their problems was much more challenging than even four years of The Calculus.
I do have a question for you. In an earlier post you stated something to the effect that stupid people don't get elected - Have you actually studied U.S. politics? Sincerely, John P.S. - I only e-mail my friends or business associates. You can read it here like the rest of us. JT
 
Here is what one of our posters said:

”- I want people to email me so that i can get their IP and report them”

Here was the response from HelgeS:

“That one is cute - and a display of a naive simpleton mind. If you check out the email address then you will notice that it is a university account. Due to the IT policies of this university (and pretty much any other larger institution in north america), IP tracing is not allowed or offered.”

What HelgeS said in his orgininal post that the TFL poster was responding to:

“I am more than willing to discuss this issue with anybody willing to do so in a friendly manner of philosophical discussion. Any flaming and other such display of immaturity will mearly result in a shrug and a report to the ISP.”

Well HelgeS, sorry but this last line sounds like a threat to me…. Sounds like some kind of child saying…. If you don’t play nice, I’m going to tell my mommy on you. See I have trouble with people who do not realize that each one of us has our own beliefs, bias and understandings of the world. Each person’s viewpoints are different. Who is to say who is right and who is wrong? You? Me? Why do you think wars are fought in the first place? Is it not because one person or group of people feel so strongly about their beliefs being right that they are willing to use force to push it on others? You miss the whole point of freedom. Freedom is coexisting with others with different beliefs. Freedom is believing what you want, doing what you want, just as long as it does not interfere with another’s rights. Since human nature is such that there will always be those among us who not only want to force others to live by their beliefs, but also to rule over them, there has to be a way for the people to defend themselves.

Governments are instituted for one purpose, to collectively defend our rights and freedoms. Democracies are dangerous to freedom in that the majority rule can and does deny rights to the minority. This is why the U.S. Constitution was built around a representative republic. To protect the rights of minorities. Force is the only real power in the world. When any group has control of force it allows them to push their beliefs on others, thus denying others freedom. Our system and the second amendment were instituted to distribute the means of force as evenly among the people as possible. This is so no one group can have a monopoly on force to use it to the determent of others. This is why we have the right to keep and bear arms and why none of us here will ever give it up.

And please don’t try and come on here an insult our intelligence with your little stories about visiting the wild west in NV. I grew up there and don’t believe a word of what you said. I grew up in a little town of a population of 35. Our nearest city had 7,000 in it. For my whole life of 50 years I never saw or heard of anyone pulling a gun on someone who did not deserve it. Those few rare instances where they were pointed at someone, they were usually an escape convict or other such criminal. See I know these people you spoke of and despite the fact that a lot of them are armed, they are peace-loving people.

All the rest of your arguments are only opinion. They are not backed up by fact or logic. For one who preports to be educated and who wishes to debate in an orderly fashion, you certainly deviate from fact and rely on emotion.



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Richard

The debate is not about guns,
but rather who has the ultimate power to rule,
the People or Government.
RKBA!
 
Forget it folks. This guy is the ultimate Troll. He is clever and obviously intelligent enough to know how to push our buttons. I do not think he even believes most of what he is saying. He just wants to see who he can rile up.

Every German I ever met and knew was ashamed of the Nazis and the hitler era. It is part of their national character.

BTW Helge I loved my stay in Germany, it is a beautiful country and the people are hard working and responsible.

I am really sorry that you are so disappointed in the members of TFL, but bear in mind that the people here are the ones who make this country work.


Geoff Ross

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One reason to vote in the next Presidential election.

It's the Supreme Court, Stupid!

[This message has been edited by K80Geoff (edited July 16, 2000).]
 
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