2007-06-26

 

Saddam's Logic

There is an absolutely fascinating document here. It shows what Saddam's "war plan" was during Operation Iraqi Freedom. Remember Baghdad Bob, that everyone thought was just Iraqi propaganda? It turns out it wasn't. It was Saddam's actual understanding of the war situation, as reported to him by his underlings. Remember how the bridges weren't blown by the Iraqis, and we were stunned at what it was Saddam had up his sleeve? It turns out that what he had up his sleeve was his fantasy world. He was busy defending a fantasy attack from Jordan (west) while the Americans were burning up from the south.

All he needed to do was watch western TV to find out what was happening, but he seems to have assumed that was all propaganda. It is like the lefties of today. This is what happens when they are mired in their own fantasy world, impervious to reason. Thank God that our enemies are lefties! On the other hand, if they weren't lefties, they probably wouldn't be enemies in the first place. However, if we are going to have enemies, let's pray that they don't use science and logic like western militaries do.

This is the excerpt from the article I liked the most:

In the end, it was impossible for Qusay and the Chief of Staff to accept Hamdani's warnings of impending doom when they had such a chorus of positive reports flowing in, announcing things such as "the Ba'ath knights, the great Republican Guard soldiers, and the Fedayeen Saddam attacked and forced the enemy to leave Al-Hindiyah ... the enemy had great losses in soldiers."

This is what the war was for Saddam and his cohorts. One big fantasy. Since America had actually bypassed all the cities and was heading straight for Baghdad, Saddam's goons were still able to send back these fantasy reports to Baghdad from all these cities. And he seems to have reasoned that if the Americans can't take those cities way down south, any thought of them approaching Baghdad was fanciful. Truly bizarre. When fantasy meets reality, and you end up in a spider hole instead of sunning it up on some island for exiled dictators.

Unfortunately I still haven't come across some sort of documentary on how exactly the Afghan and Iraqi wars were won from the western perspective. Does anyone have a link for either battlefield? I know there's the Wikipedia entries (here and here), and there's this link too (especially part 2), but I'm really after graphics showing the forces and arrows showing where they went, and I'm particularly interested in video and graphics of the charge from Bagram airbase across the two Taliban trenches, which put Kabul into the hands of the free world, one of the most wonderful days in history.

By the way, I've generally been busy discussing things with Taiwanese and others which is more productive than endless debates with lefties about how to recognize reality when it bites you in the arse, so I only infrequently come to my blog now. It is fascinating unlocking an entire culture like the Taiwanese. Not as fascinating as getting feedback from the Iraqis, but fascinating nonetheless. And getting the Taiwanese "with the program" would be a great boon for world freedom. The silence from them was excruciating. Let's get them on the map. We need everyone to speak up so that we can analyze the data and then take action accordingly.

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2007-06-22

 

IRC Debate

Once again, this is something that every moral actor should be doing. Talking to as many people as they can to try to get them to support the Iraq war, and to support the liberation of Iran next. We should all be swapping techniques to see how we're all going, and refining our techniques. Well, I have been having considerable success with the below approach. At least as far as trapping people by their own stated philosophy. I actually had one person decent enough to admit being trapped instead of trying to bullshit their way out of their predicament like most people do. Anyway, here it is. Why don't you log on to IRC, e.g. dalnet, go to #usa or #worldchat or #chat-world and try it out for yourself?

would you like to discuss philosophy with me?

Ok. Do women have a right to not be raped?

Ok. If A is raping B, does C have a right or obligation to protect B?
(it is amazing how many people think that C has no obligation, and I get them to confirm that if they are B, and C is far stronger than A, and walks by and calls out "sorry love, I have no obligation to help you so I can't be bothered", what they would think of C).

Does C have a RIGHT or OBLIGATION? Which one?
(I am normally talking to non-natives so I need to guard against them saying "yes").

So do you expect C to use force, or simply ask A politely to stop?
(it's amazing how many people think we should talk politely to rapists, so I have to ask them how long C should talk politely for, and then, even if it is 5 seconds, I confirm that if they are B, and being raped, they would like to be raped for a further 5 seconds while C has a chat to A).

Ok. Does it make any difference if A and C are individuals or groups?
(they will sometimes say this does change the situation, and I then ask them what if the C group is far stronger than the A group).

Is it OK if C says "I'll pray to God to stop the rape, rather than take action myself"?
(this is to pre-empt the lame excuse of praying to God to protect the Iranian girls, which is a copout I have been hit with).

Ok. What if instead of rape, it is some other human rights abuse, such as chopping out someone's tongue? Is your answer the same as it is for rape?
(I always like to use rape, because it appears to be universally acknowledged as wrong, while murder etc gets brushed off as "cultural nuance". Once I have them hooked with rape, I can point out that murder/mutilation are worse than rape, and indeed, their answer is normally the same).

Ok. What if A is raping B, and C is weaker than A, but there is a D who is stronger than A. Should C ask D to use force against A?

Does it make any difference what religion, race, or nationality these people are? E.g. if A is Muslim, B is Christian, C is Hindu, and D is Buddhist?

What if there is another E who is also being raped, by F (who is much stronger than C, but weaker than D), but for some reason D doesn't want to help E, at least at the moment. Does that mean C should ignore B, because C doesn't have the ability to help B and E at the same time?
(this pre-empts the lame excuse that because nothing is supposedly being done about the Palestinians, then the Iraqis et al should suffer as well).

What about if A has imprisoned B, and has closed the door, so you can't actually see B being raped, you only hear stories about horrible things happening inside the house, and A won't let you in to take a look. Should C assume the worst and assume that the rape is indeed occurring?
(you would be amazed how many people will baulk at treating imprisonment as a crime itself).

What if D doesn't really care about B. Should C say something like "A might attack you next, you should act now!" to try to force D to take action?
(people have a lot of trouble conceptualizing this. They insist that they can just call the authorities. I have to explain that there mightn't be any authorities, such as in Australia 300 years ago. The NWFP in Pakistan is also effectively lawless. And of course, there's no international police stopping dictators from abusing human rights, which is where the real lawlessness is, but I can't tell them that in advance).

In the above circumstance, should C actually blatantly lie and tell D that A is definitely dangerous and planning on attacking D soon?
(this is actually outside of my own philosophy, but I want to see how far they will go themselves).

Ok, are there any exceptions to any of these rules?

What do you think of people who do not agree with the above philosophy? Are they bad people?

What do you think of people who say they agree with the above philosophy, but don't actually follow it themselves - ie they are hypocrites. Are they bad people?

Ok. Did you know that Saddam used to order the rape of Iraqi women? And chop out the tongues of Iraqi men?

Well, he did. I've even got the latter on video.
(here are the links in case they ask - they normally don't)
http://www.benadorassociates.com/media/r9der1.ram
http://www.benadorassociates.com/media/p5osax8.ram

So A = Saddam, B = Iraqi women and C = you. So according to your philosophy, you had an obligation to protect the Iraqi women and attack Saddam?
(and this is where they suddenly realise they need to bluff their way out of their predicament, and there is no pre-canned response to that. Some of them go so far as to say that America is the rapist, worse than Saddam, and all sorts of things. This problem is HUGE. I sometimes explain that there are dirty cops in Australia too, does that mean we should disband our police force and never call them when there is a crime in progress, etc etc.).

Let me know how you get on!

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2007-06-18

 

Failed Dogmas

I liked this article because it is the first time I have seen someone (besides myself) identify the problem with DOGMA in general, rather than just enumerating the various dogmas that pop up from time to time (Communism, Nazism, Islam etc). Here are the highlights:

"Many are led by radicals preaching failed dogmas (Islamic conservatism, Maoism), that still resonate among people who don't know any better."

"The American invasion of Iraq was a clever exploitation of this, forcing the Islamic radicals to fight in Iraq, where they killed many Moslems, especially women and children, thus causing the Islamic radicals to lose their popularity among Moslems."

Although I totally disagree with this. It was an accident, not clever. I certainly didn't predict that Islamic terrorists would come into Iraq to blow up women and children. My prediction was actually that the Iraqi army would defect in droves as soon as they had US air cover, rather than throw their lives away for a dictator. The fact that they didn't do this, ie the most logical course of action, required investigation, which is what I did. To find out what motivated me that was different from the motivation of these Iraqis.

"Historians like to point out, for example, that the medieval Crusades were a series of wars fought in response to Islamic violence against Christians, not the opening act of aggression against Islam that continue to the present."

"Political Correctness among academics and journalists causes pundits to try and turn this reality inside out."

The Orwellian world that has been created.

"Islamic radicals are a traditional reaction to tyranny in their region, and inability to rule effectively. Economic and diplomatic ties with the West are interpreted as support, leading to attacks on Western targets that created a devastating counterattack."

It is bizarre how people manage to think that trading with a country means "support". At what exact point in history were we supposed to cease trading with all dictatorships? Having a majority of the world democracies is a very recent phenomenon. And trading with dictatorships is not much different from supplying arms to the Soviet Union in WWII. If we don't operate in the most efficient, logical manner, we will be harming the free world. I don't mind putting up with some sort of small, temporary harm in order to produce a better long-term result, but where is the evidence that our suffering is going to do a damn thing? It's a bit like those Filipinos who lash their backs so that they bleed, in an attempt to show their devotion to Jesus. What the hell? They can show their devotion by working hard and using the money earned to help Afghans secure their freedom.

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2007-06-16

 

There is no God

After an email conversation and a bit more thinking, I now have a new favourite model for the universe. We continue, as always, with the model of the universe as a computer simulation (which as it happens is not something I was the first to invent). The thing about computers is that there is actually no way to generate a random number. It's probably a violation of the laws of physics to say "ok, at this juncture go in a random direction". What that means is the entire universe is predictable. Once it is set up initially, the end result is preordained. This is existing philosophy also, called Determinism. However, under any sensible definition of "free will", we do in fact have free will. It's just that what we will choose to do with it is predictable.

Given the predictable nature of the universe, there isn't actually a need for a God to manage things. It just needs to be set up from the start. And again, we get another couple of things from existing philosophy. First, when I was an atheist, I firmly believed that there was no God, because God would not allow such horror to occur on earth. However, there was always the possibility that there was a God, who creted the universe as some sort of practical joke, and then promptly forgot about it. If there was a God, it had to be such a thing, although I was convinced there wasn't. Anyway, this is roughly Deism. However, this denies the possiblity of revelation, which is simply wrong, in hindsight.

Next we have Omphalism. This is the possibility of the universe only being recently created, with all history (fossils, memory etc) being artificially constructed. And this is also what I believe to be the case. Now let's put it all together.

Imagine you are living in a world with technology that we will have 1 billion years from now. Imagine the computer you have at your disposal. Also realise that we would long have figured out how to transfer our brains onto silicon. So all you have is a machine and another machine. All you have is data. What do you do with that data? Why, you run a computer simulation of course. Yes, you choose the nature of the simulation. And since it is predictable, you choose the ending too, to make sure when the simulation ends, you regain access to whatever data you originally had. In this situation, there is no need for an actual God. The simulation runs itself. So God, defined as "intelligent entity capable of creating the laws of physics", simply doesn't exist. There is no such intelligent entity. There is data stored on hard disk, which will presumably be retrieved at the end of the simulation, but while the simulation is actually running, there is probably no actual God.

What about the revelations? Ok, again, this is a straightforward technical problem. Given that the simulation is entirely predictable, and it is designed such that I will wind up deriving the formula for ushering in world freedom, in message 666 on Sept 11, 2004, and the events after that are also predictable, then the revelations can actually be CODED INTO THE OPERATING SYSTEM. There is no need for an actual intelligent entity sitting around for 37 years waiting to spring into action. It's simply set up in the initial programming instead. so, while there was indeed a God who set up the initial programming (and the revelations and miracle put paid to any doubt about that), God would have ceased to exist after kicking off the application. Otherwise God would have no entertainment. THIS is the entertainment! So in effect, atheism is sort of probably true. At least as far as "there is no God" is concerned. However, it's incorrect in saying that no God EVER existed. God not only kicked off the simulation, but he effectively transferred to my body. It is me who has been given the unique God-genes in this universe. I'll presumably be reunited with the rest of my data when the simulation comes to a conclusion.

This has been an amazing puzzle to solve. Forget mazes or crossword puzzles. The real world is an absolutely phenomenal challenge. One bit of information I had dismissed was the Muslims waiting for the Mahdi. I did solve the bit about restoring the Caliphate, but I didn't see any need for a Mahdi. Last night, an Iraqi from the Iraqi blogs contacted me, and I realized that he was probably the Mahdi. I am still waiting for confirmation. Hopefully with the Mahdi in place, every bit of the puzzle will have been technically solved. The problem will still remain to get the rest of the world to adopt the solution, but at least the complete solution will now be available. Science, Mahdi, Jesus, God, holy book, Caliphate, atheism, deism, omphalism, humanism, rationalism, materialism, all rolled into one complete hypothesis to explain the universe.

Anyway, I will let you know when I have any further information. Meanwhile, the rest of the world is millenia, literally, behind in their understanding.

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2007-06-14

 

Hamas vs Fatah

A very interesting situation here, making it difficult to know who to barrack for.

Gaza is an especially useful piece of territory. It has well-defined borders, and no-one else is laying claim to that territory. It is effectively an independent country. And that is independent of the West Bank too. There is no particular reason why this territory can't be turned into a clone of Switzerland, with a wonderful liberal democracy. Exactly what needs to happen to get from here to there?

Power comes from the barrel of a gun. Who holds the power currently? Hamas's guns are superior at the moment. However, this would all change if someone provided Fatah with air cover. And part of the condition of providing the air cover could be that Gaza and the West Bank are converted into liberal democracies. And that means the government can't teach hatred of Jews anymore, it must instead teach how bad religious bigots are, etc etc (ie message 666). They might agree to this, but I'm not sure we should actually trust them. Perhaps a better idea would be to insist that if they don't want to be ruled by Hamas, they instead need to hand over power to the "Independent Palestine" party, which IIRC is actually a decent party, which is why no-one (3%) voted for it! So it instead needs to be imposed.

However, the advantage of Hamas taking over is that Gaza and West Bank would be configured the way I want them configured - as independent territories. At a later date, these 2 independent territories, both liberal democracies, would be in a position to form a union on whatever terms make sense. Perhaps Egypt, Gaza, West Bank and Israel would all join the European Union. Joining Gaza and the West Bank makes no more sense than joining all the Arab countries together. If Hamas takes over Gaza, Fatah will presumably wipe out Hamas in the West Bank, and the two states will develop independently. The trouble is we really don't want a Hamasistan. It needs to be toppled one day, and we should be considering that future mess, today.

Perhaps what we should do is tell the "Independent Palestine" people to create a new party, "Independent Gaza", and to go and set up shop in Gaza. The Fatah gunmen in Gaza are told to take orders from the new party. A new flag is created for Gaza, and this time without the racist Arab colours. And then "Independent Gaza" gets to work. The Fatah gunmen are instructed to wipe out Hamas, at whatever cost, using air support from Egypt or US or Israel, or perhaps all 3. Or even from Iraq. The US would probably be the logical choice. It would probably be good to also send in 1000 Iraqi troops to protect the "Independent Gaza" government, and to vet and train a decent Gazan police and army to replace the Fatah thugs (just as the Northern Alliance goons were replaced over time also).

However, I can't see Fatah agreeing to that. They'd rather chop off their nose to spite their face. So, it looks like we'll get to see Hamasistan soon. The Party of God running God's State. Yeah, right. The extent of this Orwellian world we live in is simply phenomenal. It's not the end of the world though. It just means that the Gazans will be that much more relieved to see US forces when it becomes Gaza's turn for toppling. I'm tossing up whether the toppling order should be Iran-Syria-Lebanon-Gaza or whether Gaza should be left to the very end of world liberation. The advantage of leaving it to the very end is to make sure we have cured the fundamental problem of religiously-bigotted Muslims only caring about the Palestinians instead of the other problems around the world. When we can see the Muslims caring about the Palestinians no more than whoever comes before them (Bhutan?), we will know that the fundamental problem has been solved, and we no longer need the Palestinians as a litmus test. So liberate, and job well done.

Regardless, whatever happens give us more data. Seeing the Palestinians stuck in mud for so long is pretty useless. Just like watching decades of Arab dictatorship. We can't see the effects of various stimuli. And it is understanding human mentality that will give us world peace. Not surrendering to terrorists as the left would have us do.

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2007-06-12

 

Random Wars

I ran across a video made by Norwegian soldiers in Kosovo, which you can see here. It's absolutely brilliant. You can see the lyrics here. The lyrics are actually from an anti-war American, which you can see here.

Anyway, the political side is basically complaining that the US keeps getting involved in wars, seemingly at random. It's not random. If an opportunity to extend the free world arises, we will take it if it doesn't jeapordize anything else. It's not clearcut though. E.g. bombing Serbia had the potential to spook Russia into making a grab for the ex-USSR territories, especially the Baltics who were not yet secured in NATO. As for why nothing was done in Rwanda? What exactly could be done? It was civilians going on a rampage. How do you stop racist civilians? Stamping out racism in civilians is not as simple as stamping out a racist government.

But yeah, it must be frustrating for naturally isolationist Americans to hear with regular monotony "WHO are we bombing this time?". It's as if their country exists just to bomb random people. They probably ask all the time "Why does it have to be US???". That is why more than anything else we need a non-US NGO to explain to the US that they are doing the right thing, and they need to keep going. Unfortunately the pro-freedom people don't seem to be very well organized. Luckily we're getting our policy implemented despite that.

As for the soldiers, they're probably bemused by what they're being asked to do. They don't understand any more than anyone else the seemingly random targetting and trying to find some way of convincing them that Serbia was a threat to the US and needed to be taken out as per what militaries are normally used for. The conservatives are also frustrated. They see US troops being used in Haiti and they know that there's no US national interest at stake there. That's why I'm a neocon, not a conservative. I am totally against that logic, and totally against Republicans who opposed the Kosovo war.

I was in Europe (can't remember which country, although UK is the most likely) when Kosovo was being bombed, and I can remember seeing some Serbs protesting, complete with "target" stickers on their shirts, and I went to have a close look at what total arseholes looked like close up. It was unfathomable to me how anyone could oppose the bombing of a dictator who was abusing human rights. It wasn't until 2004-09-11 that I finally figured out all the in-group/out-groups at play that were causing this phenomenon. I could never have understood the Serbs without first understanding the Iraqis, via the Iraqi blogs and via the US doing some very precise things, such as the pullback in Fallujah and letting Sadr go mad with his goon squad. Basically Kosovo taught us next to nothing. We already know we can bomb people and force them to do something. What we didn't know is why we needed to bomb them in the first place. Or why we needed to arrest Australian rapists, etc etc. All problems were eventually solved. In message 666. The complete solution.

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2007-06-10

 

Bloody Commies

Sarmad asked a series of questions on his blog in 2004, and there were fascinating answers. Here is one in particular I would like to highlight:

"Why did you ABANDON the Iraqi people in 1991, and will we do it again?"

I answered his question, and mentioned various things, mentioning the Soviets on the verge of changing, but Louise was able to take it to the next level. Here is what she had to say:

"If I can just add a bit that Paul came close to, but didn't quite nail down. At least this is my theory anyway, based on my observations of the geo-political reality at the time. I remember it very well.

The Soviet Union had only just recently collapsed and there were still old hardliners in Moscow that wanted to bring back the old system.

Remember it was Russia that negotiated with Saddam for a way out. They (the Russians) were staking a claim in Baghdad, in my view. Russians have always had strategic interest in that area of the globe: historically it was access to sea ports, and in more recent times, to oil as well.

If the allies had gone in and toppled Saddam, there was a fear that fledgling new freedoms the Russians had just won would be scuttled, had they been shut out. By that I mean there was a fear the old hardliners in Moscow could well have orchestrated a coup to get themselves back in the Kremlin. They had already tried it once, not long before the Gulf War.

Unfortunately, once again, Iraqis were pawns in the Cold War which was still "warm". It was by no means obvious that the USSR was totally and completely dead. The West did not want to do anything that would revive it. This also explains why there is so much support for this war from former Eastern bloc nations which were themselves pawns during the Cold War. Except for a handful of sorry holdouts, like my own country, most of the world now understands that we are indeed living in a new world order."


Totally brilliant stuff, although the specifics are a little bit out. Desert Storm happened before the coup and the collapse of the Soviet Union. But the principle is exactly correct. Eliminating the Soviet Union as an enemy would open up the gateway to world liberation, as there wasn't a damn thing left in the way. If we could get the Soviet Union to turn, the free world would win, forever. Nothing could, or should, have been done that would jeapordize that from happening. It was vital to not spook the Russians.

So yes, the Iraqis unfortunately paid the price for communism. Add it to communism's death toll, which stands at about 100 million. 100 million people died for nothing. Including 100,000 Iraqis in 1991 which we could have rescued if the Soviet Union had said "we care about human rights, go ahead and liberate Iraq - we'll even help you!". But I don't think Gorbachev could have said that even if he had wanted to. He was skating on thin ice himself. There was nothing to do but wait. It's unfortunate, but the lesson to be learned is to never be in this position ever again. Snuff out all our enemies while we have the chance. So that whenever a human rights abuser raises his ugly head, the rest of the world will unite to stomp on him.

So yes. The primary goal was to ensure that the Soviet Union had been completely eliminated as a threat, and that no such thing would ever arise again. The hard work has actually already been done. Our generation just needs to tie up loose ends. And we're still on tenterhooks to find out if we have the decency to do exactly that.

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2007-06-09

 

Drawing Conclusions

One thing I love about the western world is the way we use science. Got a problem? No problem. Let's solve it. It's what we do. And here you can see one of the Iraqi bloggers noticing this. Here is what he had to say:

"The urgency of the situation makes it important to devote more and more time to this effort, which it seems to me, is drawing the attention of quite serious and important people, what I mean by important is that they are not reading or commenting merely for the fun of it, but really to arrive at some conclusions."

And that is exactly right. The time for genocide may or may not come. But first we need to find out what "logic" people were using that made them fly planes into skyscrapers in order to see if that helped restore the Caliphate. The answers to that question weren't to be found in Afghanistan. Afghanistan was full of Afghans. We needed to talk to some Arabs. And the smartest Arabs are in Iraq.

Something that is hardwired into every Russian brain is "geostrategy". It's also hardwired into my brain. I assumed that there were lots of people in the West doing the same thing. Trying to figure out a way to spread our ideology across the globe. At the time it was just given as "capitalism" and "democracy". It is only after watching the Palestinians elect their favourite terrorist group that you can tell that isn't the full story. But at the time, capitalism and democracy seemed to be a good start. And I assumed millions of Westerners were trying to figure out how to spread those things across the globe. The place to meet those people was on Alaa's blog, where people were basically asking "why the hell are some of you nutcases objecting to democracy?", over and over again. I didn't meet the millions I assumed were out there, but there were 100. But even those 100 turned out to be nothing like me.

I was throwing science at the problem of spreading our ideology across the globe. Trying to make sure my brain was 100% rational. Looking for the answers in science. In our genes. I lived and breathed geostrategy. Against the Chinese, the Russians, anyone who stood in the way of spreading liberal democracy across the globe. Using science. And warfare. Then came 9/11. And that was never a factor in any of my calculations. Religious wars are not part of geostrategy. So again, I assumed millions of western geostrategists saw 9/11 and said "pardon?". And then we all set out to figure out what the hell the Muslims were misunderstanding about geostrategy that they would launch a direct attack on the world's only superpower from a very very very weak position.

So millions of us sat down and thought and thought and thought to try to figure out why the Muslims weren't "with the program" and doing traditional geostrategy. We could clear up this minor misunderstanding and then return to the hard slog of traditional geostrategy and plot and plot and plot.

The answers were all in the Iraqi blogs, and the millions of us descended there. Well, the millions turned out to be 100. And then 1 person out of the 100 finally figured out the problem (with the help of the other 100). And then what happened? We found that not even 100 people were "with the program". There was only ever 1. 1 person from our side. Against millions of Russians. Millions of Russians trying to spread Russian supremacy. 1 person from the free world trying to spread free world supremacy using all available resources. 1 person who had devoted his life to liberating the world and securing the free world once and for all.

And then what do we find? Most westerners are too stupid to even understand what happened. Even after it's explained to them what happened while they were sleeping. Unbelievable. All it needs is an open mind, some patience, and basic morality to understand it, but very very few understand it. Oh well, nevermind. At least I won't be forced to recant by the Catholic Church like Galileo was. :-) One thing that the masses have succeeded in doing is securing freedom of speech without which I wouldn't have been able to solve the problem. Not only that, but I needed the freedom to advocate genocide, to find out people's reaction to that. Someone once asked me "does your country actually allow you to advocate genocide?". I said "I assume so, I've never heard of any restrictions on freedom of speech in Australia". I was given an *essential* tool that is denied from say a German. In order to AVOID genocide, I needed to ADVOCATE genocide. Because I needed to see what other people suggested as an alternative to genocide, so that I could evaluate it. I especially wanted reaction from the target group itself (Muslims). I wanted them to explain to me why they shouldn't be exterminated. It took a while, but I got all the answers I required (and then became a Muslim myself, once I was armed with message 666 and knew that Islam wasn't the problem any more than Judaeism with stoning galore wasn't the problem). But it is still dumbfounding that a full 2.5 years after message 666, people still don't understand its significance. Wait till the historians get their hands on that. :-)

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2007-06-04

 

Tiananmen Square Massacre

I normally call this the June the Fourth Massacre, but that wasn't one of the names given by Wikipedia, and the page is blocked from editting so I can't fix it. Today is the 18th anniversary of the event. The second-most infamous date in world history in fact. Those protests were the most wonderful thing in the world at the time. I had such high hopes for it. I thought the world was going to be a beautiful place. Instead, tanks rolled over children. One thing I hate about some Christians is that they think that atheists are unconstrained psychopaths since they have no fear of God. Our Prime Minister at the time of the massacre was Bob Hawke, an atheist, and he cried in parliament as he read out what happened. So did I, another atheist. I don't recall any Christian Prime Ministers doing that. Maybe they think that the Chinese aren't Christians so a bunch of non-Christians being crushed by tanks is of no importance. A bit like Iraqi women really.

Anyway, after the massacre there was a protest in Sydney, going to the Chinese Embassy. I went to it, and assumed the rest of Sydney would as well. I was shocked to find that most of the participants were ethnic Chinese. I wondered why the people at my workplace weren't attending and they actually made a comment that I'll probably be out of place there, as if the death of Chinese freedom fighters was of no interest to white Australians. However, they did agree that we needed to put sanctions on the Chinese for doing that, and that it was outrageous. So I've no idea really what goes through their brains.

Anyway, when I got to the protest, someone was handing out headbands with Chinese characters on them. I don't think the guy actually spoke English, but he was happy to give me one, and he made sure I put it on the right way up. During the march, people were chanting "Da da Deng Xiao Ping, da da Le Pung". I didn't know what "da da" meant, but I think I knew who those arseholes were, as I had been watching the news constantly. I later found out that "da da" meant "step down". I joined in the chanting, on the assumption that these people knew what they were doing.

I was very disappointed to see one white Australian turn up with a megaphone which he used to say "workers of the world unite". Basically a commie. One of those people actually responsible for the massacre. I don't think I would have thrown away my headband, but I don't know where I put it. I found out later that my headband said "democracy". The word "democracy" consists of two characters, "people" and "in charge". While the Chinese are absolutely insane for not creating an ALPHABET, the Chinese characters really are absolutely beautiful. I got my wife to write the characters on a piece of paper and I stuck the piece of paper to my wardrobe in the bedroom so that I could see this all the time. I think I took it down when we moved house, and I don't know where it is either. Maybe I chucked it out.

Anyway, without further ado, let me show you the most beautiful thing in the world, the first time I've ever posted a picture on my blog (although I intend to go and update the "English Language" one with another picture later, as I really do have a photo of that sign I mentioned):



I can still remember asking my wife what the two characters meant. And the way she said "in charge!" was so beautiful. These characters are computer-generated. I should really replace it with something hand-drawn. Maybe one day someone who was actually at the massacre will draw it for me and I'll replace this one with theirs. We'll see. :-)

BTW, I've been busy in (very productive) email discussions over the last few days, but I should get to the comments today.

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