RE: One man's opinion

From: Scott Chase (ecphoric@hotmail.com)
Date: Fri 15 Nov 2002 - 00:19:03 GMT

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    >From: Vincent Campbell <VCampbell@dmu.ac.uk>
    >Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
    >To: "'memetics@mmu.ac.uk'" <memetics@mmu.ac.uk>
    >Subject: RE: One man's opinion
    >Date: Thu, 14 Nov 2002 14:53:58 -0000
    >
    >As the moderator has alrady pointed out, this forum is not the space for
    >this kind of stuff Joe.
    >
    >Can I suggest that list-members who want to continue with such political
    >debates do so on an inter-personal level?
    >
    >I'm not excluding myself from this, BTW, I'm not afraid of political debate
    >and feel that some on the list, Joe quite clearly, need to be more informed
    >about, and understand viewpoints from other parts of the world, not just
    >the
    >USA (if, in the highly unlikely circumstance Tony Blair is a list-lurker, I
    >think you should take note of this too!).
    >
    Yeah, I've been wondering what viewpoints are behind Vlad Putin's recent diatribe against the French reporter from "Le Monde" where he starting going on a tangent about circumcision and invited the person to Moscow for surgery. Putin isn't from the US. I'm trying to see where his viewpoint may have emerged from, versus viewpoints from the US.

    The focus on Iraq may have gotten too long winded, but the threat of global networks of jihadists is an issue that is not going away and only an ostrich would stick its head in the sand and wish it away without closer analysis, which does have memetic (or cultural evolutionary topicality). Though Joe
    (and possibly myself) may have gotten too critical of the Islamist currents at play, I see no careful memetic analysis coming from the apologists either.

    What ideology compels people to engage in suicide bombings against Israeli citizens, take hundreds hostage at a Moscow theater, or fly airplanes into buildings full of people? The world has drastically shifted into a new era, where the Cold War has gone the way of the dinosaur and the new threat has interspersed itself as a cellular network into the populace of many countries, including yours.
    >
    >It's just that recently the sheer volume of traffic has been beyond my
    >ability to keep up with (and hold down my job), and I find the list so
    >useful, entertaining and challenging that genuinely unnecessary, or tenuous
    >threads get on my nerves when I'm trying to find something actually about
    >memes. That doesn't exclude politics entirely of course.
    >
    >Vincent
    >
    > > ----------
    > > From: joedees@bellsouth.net
    > > Reply To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
    > > Sent: Tuesday, November 12, 2002 3:57 AM
    > > To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
    > > Subject: One man's opinion
    > >
    > > John Hawkins: Why do you think there is such a profound
    > > difference between the American and European view of the
    > > conflict between the Israelis and the Palestinians?
    > >
    > > Victor Davis Hanson: There are a variety of reasons that can
    > > properly be debated about their relative roles. But we can agree on
    > > the general picture -- fear and appeasement of terrorists, rising
    > > Muslim populations (largely unassimilated) in France, Germany,
    > > and Scandinavia, inherent anti-Semitism, identification of Israel
    > > with the US as an overdog, proud power, guilt over past
    > > colonialism, financial interests in the Arab world, along with
    > > concerns for oil supplies, and generally the largely backdrop of
    > > easy and cheap ways of opposing the United States in ways that
    > > cost nothing but alleviate European concerns about stature, pride,
    > > and their own diminished role in the world. That is not to say
    > > there are not legitimate issues; it just explains why the Europeans
    > > would allow a quarter-million Muslims to be butchered under
    > > their noses in the Balkans when they had the power to stop it, and
    > > yet fret impotently over Palestinians far away. The end of the
    > > Soviet threat and the rise of the EU are creating a new tension in
    > > the West, and it will only quicken and manifest itself in ways well
    > > beyond disputes over the Middle East.
    > >
    > > ===============================================================
    > > This was distributed via the memetics list associated with the
    > > Journal of Memetics - Evolutionary Models of Information Transmission
    > > For information about the journal and the list (e.g. unsubscribing)
    > > see: http://www.cpm.mmu.ac.uk/jom-emit
    > >
    > >
    >
    >===============================================================
    >This was distributed via the memetics list associated with the
    >Journal of Memetics - Evolutionary Models of Information Transmission
    >For information about the journal and the list (e.g. unsubscribing)
    >see: http://www.cpm.mmu.ac.uk/jom-emit

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    =============================================================== This was distributed via the memetics list associated with the Journal of Memetics - Evolutionary Models of Information Transmission For information about the journal and the list (e.g. unsubscribing) see: http://www.cpm.mmu.ac.uk/jom-emit

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