"Bring it on"?!

Says Poirot channelling ex-PM, Julia Whatshername (you know, the one with the $2million bungalow in Adelaide).

It cannot always be about you, Poirot, and Julia is sitting up in First Class for life and feeling no pain. LOL

Suseonline, 'I'll tell the teacher on youse'(sic)

The other prep school kids must have loved you for that, best part of a century ago. (NOT!)

BTT

In a discussion there are always two sides
to the coin and most people can have
disagreements over contentious subjects without
the use of vitriol or having to stoop to personal
attacks.

Unfortunately, discussion forums also -
attract those who use internet anonymity to
shed their veneer of decency and show their ugly
sides. They take politeness as a sign of
weakness. And tend to choose their targets with that
in mind. These are basically people who want an audience
and to provoke a reaction. They want to divert the discussion
and stop meaningful dialogue. They enjoy stirring.

You have a choice. You can give them what they want
and react - or you can look at the attack for what
it is - mean nasty people - being mean and nasty.

It isn't personal if you refuse to take it personally.
They are the one with the problem.

Look at how much time has been wasted - and how off-subject
this discussion has gone. Let us learn from this and
not allow it to happen again. Next time we see either
Constance or otb - all we need do is simply scroll
past their posts.
Don't even bother to read them. Who of us really cares
what these two really think or say.

Enough said - lets move on.

Dear Suse,

The following link from the New York Times -
although a few years old -
might still be of interest:

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/12/world/europe/12poland.html

An interesting link Foxy.

I was surprised that after invitro fertilization was available for years in Poland, the Catholic Church tried to ban it.
No wonder it has upset the Poles and caused a backlash against the church in Poland.

The Catholic Church will have to move with the times if it wants to remain relevant in this world.

Argument for peace.

Here is an explanation by a native Egyptian Jesuit who takes into account recent history and the growing extreme secularism in the West; poor education in Islamic countries . Exacerbated by the West’s meddling in the Middle East.
http://m.ncregister.com/daily-news/father-samir-on-isis-what-they-are-doing-is-diabolical/%23ixzz3CCHeuFxw#.VAboCz0ayc0

This is our moral obligation:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islam_and_the_West
Historians in free countries have a moral and professional obligation not to shirk the difficult issues and subjects that some people would place under a sort of taboo; not to submit to voluntary censorship, but to deal with these matters fairly, honestly, without apologetics, without polemic, and, of course, competently. Those who enjoy freedom have a moral obligation to use that freedom for those who do not possess it. We live in a time when great efforts have been made, and continue to be made, to falsify the record of the past and to make history a tool of propaganda; when governments, religious movements, political parties, and sectional groups of every kind are busy rewriting history as they would wish it to have been, as they would like their followers to believe that it was. All this is very dangerous indeed, to ourselves and to others, however we may define otherness -- dangerous to our common humanity. Because, make no mistake, those who are unwilling to confront the past will be unable to understand the present and unfit to face the future.

I refuse to accept any more Muslim apologetics when our children’s future is at stake, and if it requires some stepping on toes, so be it.

The desire to engage with Islam in critical argument and debate is not a form of disrespect, but of esteem. Westerners who refuse to do so patronise Muslims and hypocritically oppose sexist practices and beliefs only where it is “politically correct” or expedient to do so.

Western indifference to the fate of women from other cultural or religious backgrounds is far more racist than demonstrating interest in their struggle for human rights.

When you keep on treating Muslims as children that is disrespectful.

Good stuff-- Constance

<<<Westerners who... hypocritically oppose sexist practices and beliefs only where it is “politically correct” or expedient to do so>>

Yeah saw that patron saint of feminism Germaine Greer do just that on ABC Q&A --and that alter boy/girl of feminism Poirot does it all the time.