epoch;474237]That would most likely help. Hell, nobody in Germany would consider it a bad idea. But don't you consider it strange that feminists talk about a perceived rape culture on campus, yet completely ignore a culture that considers western clad women filthy whores? And trust me: I have heard that phrase all to often. And doesn't it strike you that as these kind of things happen a number of people, quite often exactly the same people that try to bring perceived campus rape culture under attention, refuse to bring up migrants culture?
I know exactly what you mean, but I don't find it "strange" exactly. Where politics is concerned, and "feminism" in the sense that we're discussing it is a political movement, in my opinion, I gave up expecting consistency and rationality a long time ago.We have Hillary Clinton pontificating that every rape allegation made by a woman should be believed, but there are several outstanding ones against her husband which she vehemently denies. Carly Fiorina, who rose through the ranks to head a huge corporation, is told she is anti-feminist because she is anti-abortion except in extreme circumstances. It goes on and on.
Yes, I saw you had a Oriana Fallaci avatar a while ago.
I don't and never did subscribe to her politics or to some of her more extreme statements about Islam, although she made some salient points about the need for Europe to maintain its culture and values. The primary reason I used her as an avatar for a while is because I admired her intellect, her integrity, her strength, and her courage tremendously, as well as the depth of the love that she could give. When she was barely a girl she was a partisan fighting the Nazis and the Italian fascists. She wound up tearing off her burka in front of Khomeini. What a woman!
Ha! This is very interesting, because it forces me to think on how my bullshit filter - an indispensable asset - works. There is the fact that the story is made from pieces, all gathered from different sources with different "interests". The Baltimore stories were all coming from people with the same "interest", i.e. trying to prove that the police shoots random blacks. There is the fact that the officials didn't try to cover up the stories of harassment anymore, once the story broke, but try to cover up the fact that these were recent asylum seekers, which to me points out that they were aware of the harassment stories and knew how bad it was. Lastly, what surfaced looked like something that isn't at all commonly known in Europe but has been occurring in the Middle East:
http://speisa.com/modules/articles/...-taharrush-and-now-it-has-come-to-europe.html
Well, the reality is more complicated both here and in Europe, in my opinion. In the U.S., a friend of the victim first said it. Then, more and more people said it. Why? Some probably wound up thinking they did see it. You'd be surprised what the power of suggestion can do. Some undoubtedly said it because of a political agenda. Yet we now know that it wasn't true. Has it occurred to you to ask why? There wasn't any video or any pictures. The reason is that dozens of African-Americans from the community who were present went to the police to testify as to the truth, and their testimony was totally consistent with the forensics, whereas the testimony of the other "witnesses" was totally inconsistent not only with the forensics, but inconsistent between the witnesses themselves.
The other important thing to know is that there are indeed racist cops and cops who are trigger happy. You don't have to trust me on this one. We had two other cases in close proximity which were caught on film and which showed white cops literally shooting down some black kids who were absolutely no danger to the policeman or to anyone else. So, people in poor, black communities aren't delusional to be suspicious of the police. Nor do the police departments want cops like this; these guys were immediately put into custody and charged.
In the case of these recent events in Europe I haven't been following it as closely so I'm not sure what my "meter" would say. From Alan's post it seems to me that there could have been some exaggeration going on, or out and out fantasy in some cases, like the supposed conversation about the cards and tearing them up. That one "smells" a bit to me, as did the "Hand's Up, Don't Shoot" one. Anti-immigrationists in Europe, like black activists in the U.S., have an agenda, and it's really easy to somehow come up with the "perfect" image or sound bite to support that agenda. Of course, it's impossible for me to know if it really happened. It seems that even the origin of these men is unclear.
The point is that politicians and political activists and journalists from all sides of the political spectrum jump to the conclusion that fits their template, their agenda. I never trust any of them. Law enforcement and prosecutors have to take each individual case and try to find out the truth, no matter where it leads. Unless they can do this, any society is doomed.
I'll tell the responsible people next time I meet them

On a serious note, every involvement in this situation means picking a side, in a conflict without good sides. I know and understand that realism dictates that we must act despite the fact that all acts have nasty consequences - something brilliantly summarized by an Australian politician with the line: "
Only the impotent are pure". But apart from maybe the Kurds we seriously want to avoid supporting
any side, at this point in the Syrian war. The only other option we may have would be supporting Assad. Potent, but very,
very impure would be to strike a deal with him and and offer support for accepting back migrants. What is the level of impurity we are willing to accept?
I'm a big proponent of realpolitik, but I don't think Assad is acceptable; he's too tainted by what he's authorized. There have to be other people, military people, perhaps. Look at Egypt. This hands off policy is what got you, all of us, into this mess. No one is even supporting Jordan. How many refugees can they continue to take in? What happens if that government falls too?
I tend to like Ian Kershaw more on the subject, and to have a look at what Germans thought during the 12 Nazi years this book:
http://press.princeton.edu/titles/1051.html
I can totally understand why you like his work more, but that doesn't mean it's more accurate. I'm sure you're aware of the criticism of his work, criticism with which I agree. Most people are cowards, so you can't expect too much from them in situations where disagreement or making waves would be dangerous for them and their families. However, there were differences country by country in terms of the level of anti-semitism that existed in Europe both prior to World War I and in the period between World War I and World War II. There were differences in terms of how many people were willing to take an active role in the front line against "undesirables", and at the opposite end of the spectrum how many people were willing to risk their lives to save victims of these policies, even when they were all ruled by the same groups. Kershaw should have done a comparison of the Italian situation versus that in Germany and eastern Europe before he drew some of his conclusions. Not that I mean to say that Italy isn't greatly culpable in what it allowed to happen to its small Jewish minority. It's a disgrace, in fact, a hideous betrayal of a community highly integrated into Italian society, and which had contributed a great deal to Italy on all levels ever since it had been allowed to do so. Many of the ones who survived have neither forgotten nor forgiven, and I don't blame them at all. It can't be denied, however, that there were major differences between the two countries, not least that fascism as conceived by Mussolini was quite different in this regard from Nazism as conceived and voted for by Germans. Until 1938, there were still fully Jewish members of the Italian Fascist party, and in quite high positions.
I didn't read the linked to book. I was aware of it, but didn't bother reading it... too much evidence to the contrary, not to mention the dictates of common sense.
See the following summary of the Italian record on anti-Semitism and the atrocities against Jews.
http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/article.php?ModuleId=10005455
There are entire volumes about the experiences of the Italian Jews during this period, and the differences between Italian Fascism and German Nazism for that matter. It's quite one of my major areas of interest in terms of history for rather personal reasons. If you're ever interested, I could provide links.