The Other Worlds Shrine

Your place for discussion about RPGs, gaming, music, movies, anime, computers, sports, and any other stuff we care to talk about... 

  • "Oops."

  • Somehow, we still tolerate each other. Eventually this will be the only forum left.
Somehow, we still tolerate each other. Eventually this will be the only forum left.

 #135490  by Mental
 Thu Apr 23, 2009 2:49 pm
What's the oops? Other than the profanity, this is absolutely no different from the usual neocon party line...

I mean, obviously it's ridiculous. "We are America. Ergo everything we do is right!"

I used to be freaked out beyond words when I found out what the party line was there. But thankfully my high school taught history very well. This is still awful, but America does have a rather unfortunate tendency to say that human rights only apply during peacetime. Strange as it may be to say, the Bush administration's policies were fairly mild as far as the historical tendency towards hateful "patriotism" in wartime goes...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sedition_Act_of_1918

"The Sedition Act of 1918 (May 16, 1918) was an amendment to the Espionage Act of 1917 passed at the urging of President Woodrow Wilson, who was concerned that dissent, in time of war, was a significant threat to morale. The passing of this act forbade Americans to use "disloyal, profane, scurrilous, or abusive language" about the United States government, flag, or armed forces during war. The act also allowed the Postmaster General to deny mail delivery to dissenters of government policy during wartime."

I mean, can you imagine how many people would have been tossed in jail if that had passed in 2002?

We used waterboarding in the Spanish-American War, and "remember the Alamo" was really about losing a battle in spreading slavery into Texas, among a few other things. America, for all that I truly love our genuine tendency towards peace and freedom on our good side, also has a really ignorant nativist dark side, and it pops up every hundred years or so at least. It also tends to eat itself out after awhile, as hatred tends to do, and I think we're at the start of the downward trend now, but...still. It hurts my heart to see all this shit, but it's nothing new. There IS nothing new under the sun.

 #135491  by Mental
 Thu Apr 23, 2009 2:54 pm
Oh, my bad. He actually MEANT it. I thought this was the usual "what we did isn't torture" line...

 #135492  by Kupek
 Thu Apr 23, 2009 2:58 pm
It's a quote, not my interpretation.

 #135493  by Sassafras
 Thu Apr 23, 2009 3:02 pm
Sorry Bush administration but the only person who can successfully perform torture in this world is Jack Bauer.

 #135509  by Tessian
 Thu Apr 23, 2009 5:46 pm
I missed the 'oops' there too... he wasn't saying that America doesn't torture, he was saying it in a way that meant "We are better than that, we shouldn't torture".

I hate Fox news, but that's how I took what he said

 #135510  by Kupek
 Thu Apr 23, 2009 5:55 pm
Tessian wrote:I missed the 'oops' there too... he wasn't saying that America doesn't torture, he was saying it in a way that meant "We are better than that, we shouldn't torture".

I hate Fox news, but that's how I took what he said
I think that's clearly what he meant. The "Oops," which I found funny, was because he accidentally said "fucking" on the air.

 #135521  by SineSwiper
 Thu Apr 23, 2009 8:52 pm
Tessian wrote:I missed the 'oops' there too... he wasn't saying that America doesn't torture, he was saying it in a way that meant "We are better than that, we shouldn't torture".

I hate Fox news, but that's how I took what he said
Yeah, Shepard Smith is a fucking neocon asshole, but I have to give him props for FINALLY getting it.