Starting to get tired of this forum

I see nothing preventing anyone from starting or holding a serious conversation here at PF.

When have you indulged in either endeavor?

Ever?

And if you have, who stopped you?

 

I see none of the more intellectual members have yet completed their deliberations on the subject of your query. But, I think it's a darned good question! And it deserves an answer!

 

Well there is actually. There are so few people who are capable of intelligent debate. A person cannot debate themselves (well they can, but it would just seem very schizophrenic). And as I pointed out, the biggest problem is peoples certainty!! Most people here are not without the capacity for intelligence. They are simply so certain of themselves, that they are unwilling to legitimately engage any alternative ideas. I mean, if one believes that Obama is the devil out to destroy the American way of life, how can they expect to intelligently, thoughtfully, and politely engage with anyone who supports Obama? They can't. Similarly, people who think all Republicans are dumb inbred rednecks, who all hate Obama because he is black, cannot intelligently engage with anyone who disagrees with Obama.

For example, I am on the left, but I hate Obama. I have been accused by Democratic partisans of disliking him out of racism. Even more regularly, people make some absurd comment along the lines that I am worshiping "dear leader maobama," simply because I attempt to interject some reason into their attempts to smear him for nonsensical, illegitimate, or entirely invented reasons. It can be very frustrating. If I don't believe Obama is exactly the same as Hitler, I am automatically assumed to support him. How can you have intelligent conversations with such people? It is especially frustrating, because there are so many legitimate reasons to dislike him, that there is no reason to invent reasons. All it does is cast a negative light on all the other legitimate criticisms!!

 

What do you think the grand bargain was that the Saudi Royal family made with the religious leaders of the Grand Mosque area of Mecca to resolve the 1979 hostage crisis there?

What do you think the money went to funding?

What did they tell our academics about Jihad?

Answer those three questions, in order, and you'll discover I am speaking from facts I learned online.

Try it.

 

Your questions don't seem to be relevant. You said that academics all believe that Jihad is a primarily spiritual endeavor. However, I can link you to dozens of books from academia about political Islam, terrorism, etc. They may make some passing reference to the spiritual side of Jihad, but that is a footnote or a few pages at most. All the rest is about the other kind of Jihad, because you will find very few academics, other than those in religious studies, who find the subject of internal spiritual striving to be one worthy of study (that doesn't mean none of course, but not to the extent the other kind of jihad).

PS. You seem to be on an interesting path, if you are going where I think you are going. It just isn't relevant to what you said before. Just out of curiosity, expand on what you are saying. If it is what I think, I can send you some links from non-internet sources.

 

What if both points of view are mistaken?

What if both views are correct?

What if the Republicans ARE dumb inbreds?

What if Obama really IS carrying out his stated intent to "fundamentally transform America" in a way that will force this country's economic system to have to start all over from zero? (As the Cloward-Piven strategy is meant to accomplish. And which Obama studied during his association with A.C.O.R.N.)

[video=youtube;-g6SpnTcMx8]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-g6SpnTcMx8[/video]

 

And he is playing this super sneaky game where all his actions are those of a corporatist-centrist?!?!? All to throw people off the scent!! But certain Republican can see past irrelevancies like policy decisions, and look into his soul!! They just know he is on a leftist crusade to fundamentally change the country!! I mean he passed Obamacare!! Never mind that it is essentially the Republican plan from the 1990s when Clinton tried to reform healthcare. And never mind Mitt Romney passed something surprisingly similar in MA. It is radical socialism at its worst, and proof of Obama's nefarious intention!!

PS. I hate Obamacare, it's just fundamentally NOT radical. It was largely written by health insurance lobbyists, not exactly radicals attempting to undermine the system. More like capitalists trying to get the government to legally mandate that millions of people buy their products and services!!

 

This is the reason why I'm leaving this forum for an extended period of time and only checking in every now and then. This entire forum is toxic at this point, with extreme partisans on both sides shouting back and forth at each other while accomplishing nothing.

 

It all depends on the OP for me. If the OP is just "check out my (*)(*)(*)(*)ty logic, what you other guys got to say", obviously that's not really a debate, it's a measuring stick for OP to see who has the same faulty logic.

Not to call out specific people, but I will anyway (lulz) but Logical1 is the worst.

His/her posts sound like this:

"The rainbow is only made of green colors, who's with me!"

Not really a start to a meaningful debate by any means, but someone keeps letting this tool make new topics so whatevs. If it bothers you, maybe talking to the mods would create a better place to debate. I'm always down for defending positions I don't agree with when the facts are on that side, however, most of the posts I see are using ridiculously partisan sources as their 'this is right' backup.

It's like, "I'm wrong, here's a guy who's made a career of being wrong and he backs me up!" It's not meaningful debate.

HOwever, I still come and participate in those kind of things just to see what people are citing and saying so I can be prepared to make people think when I talk to them in person. I don't like people that don't think. I also don't like extremes and currently our political spectrum in the United States is all about extremism. It's basically the right setting an extreme position and anyone who has something to say ANYTHING about it is an extreme counter balance, despite whether the counter argument is a compromise. Thus our current shutdown.

It does nothing but just create chaos and not dialogue. Unfortunately this climate boils over into the dialogue here.

 

I didn't say ALL islamic academics were spreading that misleading notion to American academics.

The ones who put forth that idea were intellectual Jihadists who wanted to make sure that America would give Jihadists and all Muslims (who are ALL obligated by the Koran to perform Jihad) a warm welcome and not be at all alarmed or on the defensive at the prospect of increasing numbers of Muslims entering the United States.

The idea of radical Wahhabist Saudis sponsoring educational materials and curriculae to be used in American schools to help indoctrinate Americans depended entirely on the success of that Islamic misinformation campaign.

They calmed our academics and our academics innocently spread that misinformation which calmed and misinformed other professors and students and they graduated and went to work in our board rooms and news rooms to influence the entire nation and most of our political leaders.

That is why half of America resists recognizing the truth about Muslims and Islam and acting on that information to resist the efforts of succeeding generations of jihadists intent on conquering, killing converting and captivating us all..

AND I THANK YOU FOR CONFIRMING FOR THOSE WHO MIGHT HAVE ANY DOUBTS THAT JIHAD IS NOT AN EXCLUSIVELY SPIRITUAL ENDEAVOR.

It can be any type of struggle which furthers the aims, goals and progress of Islam toward the ultimate objective of a Global Caliphate.

Islamic domination the World over.

 

We have never seen anyone like Barack Obama. He cannot be judged the way we have any who have gone before him in America or anywhere in the world at any time in history.

Where a few real devils come to mind to compare him to, they all used violence and resorted to killing millions of their own people to gain or solidify their own evil grasp of the reins of power.

Conversely, Barack Obama has accomplished what he has with his knowledge of the law and the rules learned from his Communist/Marxist mentors and radical associates, his intellect, guile, charm and good looks.

That he was able to do what he has done without firing a shot is truly remarkable.

For him to accomplish what he has without firing a shot and still remain viable in the eyes of so many Americans who he is politically 'enslaving' makes him the greatest politician at least in the past 150 years IMHO.

 

I suspect they would have to agree that it does.

 

And then some are overeducated blowhards. That's the great thing about this country... the dullards you look down on have the same right to an opinion as anybody else.

And they can vote.

I know, disgusting ain't it?

 

I think that one-liner posts that have no useful content should be discouraged.

(Like this one)

 

Mine too.

 

What you can do to actively improve the forum is ignore the trolls, and those that just spit out their repeated one-liners, and in time they will give up.
Don't respond to those that do the things you dislike, and hope that others don't also. When you do, they wipe the drool from their chins and start slamming their fingers on their keyboards with just another silly response.
For them it is all about attention.


But I think the bigger problem with your statement is that you think people can "become better posters".

People are who they are, and there is nothing strangers on some online political forum, amongst a hundred other political forums, is going to do to make them approach a conversation in a way different than they do.


Pay attention to those you respect and ignore those who you don't.

My weakness is telling people why I don't respect them.
But I'm working on it.

 

The question is whether that struggle is useful. Are the American left and right simply being manipulated into domestic hostilities while those who control the two parties continue to do what they want to do behind the scenes? When our choices on election day are limited to two, and when those two are controlled by the same monied interests, can it be said that we are in any way in control of our own government? I think not. I just see a circus.. I see the elites regularly shaking the jar and getting the angry little american ants to fight each other.

 

Well I certainly think that people can become better posters. Unless there isn't a measure of the quality of posts, people can be better or worse posters, and that can change. There are lots of things that can gear people towards the correct or desired changes, but no one can make someone else be a better poster.

 

The point has nothing to do with people being stupid, and everything to do with them being arrogant and lacking self-awareness. People of average intelligence who are aware of that fact can better themselves greatly. People of average intelligence who have convinced themselves of their own brilliance are never going to learn or change, because they see no need to, I mean they are already brilliant right? That is the problem. People who are not nearly as intelligent as they think they are. Not unintelligent people!!

 

I don't know, frodly. Its very hard to judge the intelligence of folks by posts on a message board. Even the person with the lowest IQ on PF is probably more informed that your avg joe on the street. This is no place for the out of touch.

But of course, I agree that some here have an overblown opinion of their own self worth. Same's true in life.

 

I seriously doubt anything I do or say on this forum, no matter how rude I can be, will have any measurable affect on the political nature of the country at large.

 

Very true. It is mostly progressives who have left because of the right wing slant of the forum's admin and their bias in favor of the deluded reactionaries. I spend far less time here than I used to but I do learn a lot from the smarter, more progressive posters. I post in order to learn from exchanging ideas with them.

 

Most forum have denigrated to partisan hackery and flaming back and forth from both sides. If you post something on most sites now with the intention of discussion youre immediately trolled and insulted and yes it gets tiring but that is the political climate now, both sides have the claws out and its no holds barred, Ive never seen it this bad in my 45 yrs of being able to legally vote and I dont see it getting any better. Ironically before reading this post I had told my wife earlier I was strongly considering a permanent hiatius from political forums.

 

I don't see that slant.

In fairness... I only notice 2 mods posting.
One woman is ALWAYS part of the pro-abortion side of abortion threads.
One guy seems on the conservative side.
So those 2 are split.

2 others I am aware of I only see when they infract me and delete my threads.
But I don't assume it's because they are lefties.
I assume other things.

The last one I have had decent conversation with in PMs, and it wasn't political, so I can't say.

 

I guess it's a matter of personal experience for each of us. In past private communications with others, progressives have complained of the right wing slant of the admin. I have also documented past biases to the board but nothing was ever done to correct this problem.

There are other forums where progressives can post. The sad part is that the deluded right wingers will miss out on the Truth.

So be it