Saddam Hussein Executed

[SlackDad]

Originally Posted by Xaccers

So you know all about the Blackpool plans then?

By not taking action to help keep a nation from expanding into other territories, you are supporting that nation's actions, whether you like it or not.

If you walk on by while one kid beats up another kid in the street, you're supporting that kid in his attack.

If we take support to mean 'agree with' or 'encourage' then I think your logic is flawed. By not intervening does not necessarily mean that we agree with or encourage. There could be any number of reasons why a nation can't take action or we can't stop a kid attack another kid. For instance fear for your own safety, not having the capacity to name just two.

By not doing anything may mean you haven't affected the result, but this most definitely doesn't mean you supported that result.

[Xaccers]

Originally Posted by foreverwar

mmmm... Xaccers, shouldn't you be over in Iraq now, stopping the torture and killings? Or are you supporting them by not doing anything (see, I can use fallacious extreme examples as well )

Why do I need to to be in Iraq to play my part in bringing the torture and killings to an end?

Originally Posted by punky

Unfortunately you jumped it before I had chance to edit my post to make the analogy a bit more closer to Saddam.
.... snip...
However, in another dimension, they might not have been. The protests might have stopped a war that would have removed him (force is the only thing that could have, I hope we agree on that at least).
......
Note my edit which appeared before your post. But both analogies are the same, although the post-edit is clearer than the other. It doesn't matter what your motivation is, you still have to accept the results of your actions.

Yeh - sorry, mate, I was replying to the posts you had posted, not the posts you were re-posting while I was posting a reply to your original posts - so, I would have found it difficult to know that you had edited your posts before I hit the reply button.

"However, in another dimension, they might not have been" - excellent, I must remember to use that one sometime - "OK, Hitler was evil, invaded countries, and instigated policies that led to the death of sixty two million people, but in another dimension, he was really, really nice, and founded Amnesty International".

As you said, I think we must agree to differ on this, as we are probably taking up too much server space with this

[Xaccers]

Originally Posted by SlackDad

If we take support to mean 'agree with' or 'encourage' then I think your logic is flawed. By not intervening does not necessarily mean that we agree with or encourage. There could be any number of reasons why a nation can't take action or we can't stop a kid attack another kid. For instance fear for your own safety, not having the capacity to name just two.

By not doing anything may mean you haven't affected the result, but this most definitely doesn't mean you supported that result.

By doing nothing we are sending a message that such behaviour is acceptable.
Phoning the police from round the corner and letting them know what is going on so that they can intervene is doing something, how is the attacker going to know it was you?

Originally Posted by Xaccers

So you know all about the Blackpool plans then?

By not taking action to help keep a nation from expanding into other territories, you are supporting that nation's actions, whether you like it or not.

If you walk on by while one kid beats up another kid in the street, you're supporting that kid in his attack.

Originally Posted by Xaccers

By doing nothing we are sending a message that such behaviour is acceptable.
Phoning the police from round the corner and letting them know what is going on so that they can intervene is doing something, how is the attacker going to know it was you?

Wouldn't you have to "walk on by" to get to the phone around the corner?

Two good quotes from a bbc news webpage of the time - doesn't sound like TB thinks the protestors were "implicitly" supporting Saddam.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/2773771.stm

"Mr Blair said he "should and does listen to the thousands that marched on Saturday" in anti-war protests. He insisted most of the marchers were not against war in all circumstances but were opposed to a war that was "rushed or unnecessary".

And a quick quote from Charles Kennedy on the same page, which (imho) think is quite relevant considering some of the comments made in this thread.
""The prime minister implies - in making his moral case for regime change - that anyone who is not yet persuaded of the need for war is somehow less moral than he is.
"A lot of people in this country will resent that implication."

Originally Posted by Xaccers

So you know all about the Blackpool plans then?

By not taking action to help keep a nation from expanding into other territories, you are supporting that nation's actions, whether you like it or not.

If you walk on by while one kid beats up another kid in the street, you're supporting that kid in his attack.

Possibly .... however, should I not walk on by, there are a range of options open to me, 'military action' (i.e. setting upon the attacker) being just one of them. Calling for a diplomatic solution is another option. It's unreasonable to paint those who called for diplomacy as 'walking on by' just because the solution they support differs from yours.

[Xaccers]

Originally Posted by foreverwar

Wouldn't you have to "walk on by" to get to the phone around the corner?

Depends which corner the phone is around
The fact is, you've actually done something.
If you walk on by and then go about your business without making any effort to have the attack stopped, you're sending a message that the attack is acceptable.

Similarly, if the only way to oust Saddam was through war, and you won the protest against the war, you can't then say "oh but we didn't want to keep Saddam in power"
By stopping the war, you are accepting that Saddam remained in power.
People may not like to admit that, but its true.
If having Saddam in power was unacceptable, then the war would not have been protested.
It works like this, the anti-war people would have accepted Saddam remaining in power, as long as it meant we didn't go to war. There was no other way to remove Saddam, diplomacy wouldn't have worked, and interal revolt was a failure.
So for them to say that they want saddam out, but won't accept the only way to do it, means that they therefore accept that Saddam would have remained in power.

[danielf]

Originally Posted by Xaccers

By doing nothing we are sending a message that such behaviour is acceptable.

And herein lies the rub imo. In Punky's statement, as well as the Polaris example, there is an implicit assumption that the protestors wanted to do nothing. I imagine there will have been loads who felt that other options had not yet been exhausted. It's not a binary distinction.

[Xaccers]

Originally Posted by Chris T

Possibly .... however, should I not walk on by, there are a range of options open to me, 'military action' (i.e. setting upon the attacker) being just one of them. Calling for a diplomatic solution is another option. It's unreasonable to paint those who called for diplomacy as 'walking on by' just because the solution they support differs from yours.

How exactly would diplomacy have removed Saddam?
"Hi Saddam, its Kofi here, yes, his father, would you mind stepping down and not letting your sons take over? No? Oh ok, we're angry by that, so we'll send you a letter telling you how angry we are, what do you think of that? Why are you laughing?"

[punky]

Originally Posted by foreverwar

Yeh - sorry, mate, I was replying to the posts you had posted, not the posts you were re-posting while I was posting a reply to your original posts - so, I would have found it difficult to know that you had edited your posts before I hit the reply button.

Dude, chill out. I wasn't saying it was your fault. Also, you don't have to be nasty either.

[hatedbythemail]

Originally Posted by danielf

And herein lies the rub imo. In Punky's statement, as well as the Polaris example, there is an implicit assumption that the protestors wanted to do nothing. I imagine there will have been loads who felt that other options had not yet been exhausted. It's not a binary distinction.

thats it.

---------- Post added at 16:07 ---------- Previous post was at 16:05 ----------

Originally Posted by punky

Dude, chill out. I wasn't saying it was your fault. Also, you don't have to be nasty either.

says the man who falsely accused millions of decent europeans and indeed americans of supporting saddam ;-)

[punky]

Originally Posted by danielf

In Punky's statement, as well as the Polaris example, there is an implicit assumption that the protestors wanted to do nothing.

No there isn't.

Originally Posted by Xaccers

How exactly would diplomacy have removed Saddam?
"Hi Saddam, its Kofi here, yes, his father, would you mind stepping down and not letting your sons take over? No? Oh ok, we're angry by that, so we'll send you a letter telling you how angry we are, what do you think of that? Why are you laughing?"

You make a perfectly good point but it doesn't answer mine. Just because someone takes an action you disagree with, does not mean they are doing nothing. You cannot accuse those who favoured diplomacy of 'walking on by'.

[punky]

Originally Posted by hatedbythemail

says the man who falsely accused millions of decent europeans and indeed americans of supporting saddam ;-)

Says the man who refuses to read my posts.

[Xaccers]

Originally Posted by Chris T

You make a perfectly good point but it doesn't answer mine. Just because someone takes an action you disagree with, does not mean they are doing nothing. You cannot accuse those who favoured diplomacy of 'walking on by'.

Diplomacy which kept Saddam in power where he could kill and starve Iraqi's?

To try and resolve a problem with an inefectual solution is like tackling the attacker in the street by tying your shoelaces then going home.