Meanwhile, over in Socialist Eastern Europe, people were getting shot on TV jumping over the Berlin Wall. They were trying to escape from poverty stricken socialist dictatorships to get into prosperous free countries with free markets. The explanation of the Socialist left was that the Berlin Wall was to stop people from capitalist countries from flooding into socialist countries. And the people getting shot jumping over the Wall were all western spies and saboteurs. Even Lexi could probably fiure out that that was complete BS. But I had an uncle like you who was a True Believer, and he believed it. He was actually upset that the could not go to the USSR and see The Workers Paradise for himself.

Now, the desire to not seek war is a noble one. But I am a realist, I and I understand the primary reason for war. Human beings are tribal and territorial. Two different cultural groups will fight over the resources in any territory. And that is instinctive. It is in our DNA.
No amount of sitting around a campfire singing "Kumbaya" is going to change that. Nor is mixing up the races in "multicultural" societies. Because unless you are deaf, dumb, and blind, you must be able to see that most conflicts today are within culturally divided nations. All we are doing is creating new future battlefields.

Now, you explain to me how you can ignore the failure of socialism and then blame the system which won for everything that ever went wrong in the world

LEGO, thanks for your detailed answer. I understand you perfectly and will not attempt to argue with you or try to refute your right-wing rationale.

I do have one question however. When the world ends in a nuclear holocaust, one caused by human greed and a love of war and plundering, will you applaud enthusiastically just before you and those dear to you are vaporized?

To David G

You asked me how I came to my worldview and I told you. I could have written 5000 words, but I had to make do with 500. In return, I asked you to justify your own position, and what did you do? You dodged it.

Look mate, this is the reason why I laugh at socialists and trendy lefties. You and your friends are very good at criticising everything but asked a polite question and you do the runner.

I can only conclude that your position is poorly held and you are frightened of defending your own ideology. I have been on debate sites for over 10 years and I have seen a lot of trendies like you. They ask questions, and ask questions, and they make moral declarations, after moral declaration, but rarely do they ever even try to submit a reasoned argument that could shine some light on how they came to think in such an incredible way.

Any impartial observer who happened upon our posts would naturally decide that I am being open and honest, while you, for all your moral posturing, are being coy and elusive. Unless you can justify your own position with a reasoned argument then you are going to lose to me every time.

If you do have some brains then you had better start using them. If you are unable to defend your own position, could I respectively propose that it is because it is wrong? If your position can not stand up to critical examination, then what are you, as a supposedly intelligent person doing defending it?

You are now asking me another question, a loaded one which means that I must accept that your position is right before I can even answer it. Sorry mate. Answer my question and then I will think about answering yours. If you can't manage that, then what are you doing in the arena? Draw your sword, admit defeat, or go and rethink your ideology. Because passionately defending a position which you can not justify is not what an intelligent person does.

"You are now asking me another question, a loaded one which means that I must accept that your position is right before I can even answer it," says LEGO!

I rest my case!

Dear LEGO,

The people who wrote the bible were ignorant of the things that are important for most people today. OTOH It is likely that they were well-versed in other matters which today only few find interest in.

A shift in values occurred, especially around the 17th century, and with it a shift in language and terminology. It's silly to attempt reading the bible in modern English as if written by contemporary (but ignorant) people, simply because the translated words as spelled still have a meaning today, albeit other than the original.

As I read the first chapter of Genesis, I understand it as a hymn in praise of the Sabbath, with the punch-line appearing at the beginning of the second chapter (dividing the bible into chapters occurred only in the 13th century!). What was most important to the ancients in this case is to justify and explain the importance of having a day of rest - they couldn't care less how this piece of rock they stood on came about or those different lights in the sky that appear in the day and in the night: that they even considered such questions is a late projection by people of a totally different era.

So why then read the bible at all (or any other ancient scripture)?
Haven't we plenty of excellent and accurate geology and astronomy text-books already?

-Because it contains some forgotten truths, like the value of taking a regular day off, away from creating new things - how refreshing and badly missing in this restless 24/7 society!

So here again we face a problem with language:

Was it Capitalism that won over the hearts and minds of East-Europeans, or was it free-market? Were they so excited to trample down the Berlin wall only in order to replace their master, instead of being slaves to the communist state, becoming slaves to Capital and the corporations who had it? I think not. Also, was it only butter, eggs and toilet-paper that they were after, or was it also personal freedom, including the freedom of speech, movement, association and religion?