[General Battuta]

No, it's bollocks to claim that the two are even remotely morally equivalent.  That Times article is dead on.

From the view of Arabs who believe they're suffering the oppression of the capitalist West, yeah, seeing their enemy hurt would be about the same as us seeing our terrorist enemy hurt.

Like I said, if they killed the president or something, and celebrated, it would be equivalent.

Yes, exactly.  I'd probably be outraged at that sort of celebration myself, but I'd at least recognize that they have a leg to stand on.  Killing a governmental or military leader, someone directly invested in national policy, is a purposeful act of war.  Killing innocent civilians is pure evil.

Then we're not really on much higher ground than Osama bin Laden, are we? (Not saying you think we are, but it's a point worth making).

After all, we elect our leaders.

[Mars]

Yes; we've killed civilians to, but its not something we generally celebrate. No we're not doing much better than Osama in that sense, but that's another discussion.

What we were discussing here is the morality of celebrating Osama's death vs. celebrating 9/11.


Celebrating 9/11 would be like us celebrating the time Blackwater opened fire on all those civilians. I KNEW someone who did, and I thought he was a despicable person.

[zookeeper]

No, it's bollocks to claim that the two are even remotely morally equivalent.  That Times article is dead on.

From the view of Arabs who believe they're suffering the oppression of the capitalist West, yeah, seeing their enemy hurt would be about the same as us seeing our terrorist enemy hurt.

Precisely. The dummies on both sides see that "enemy hurt", figure that "enemy bad, so enemy hurt good" and then go celebrate.

Anyway, now that you brought up the Times article... it was stupid. Glorifying revenge and calling it "justice", "civilized and morally sound" is about as backwards as you can possibly get. Revenge isn't civilized. It's not justice. It's not morally sound. It's exactly the opposite almost by definition, for goodness' sake.

[Nuclear1]

Yes; we've killed civilians to, but its not something we generally celebrate. No we're not doing much better than Osama in that sense, but that's another discussion.

What we were discussing here is the morality of celebrating Osama's death vs. celebrating 9/11.


Celebrating 9/11 would be like us celebrating the time Blackwater opened fire on all those civilians. I KNEW someone who did, and I thought he was a despicable person.

It's not a matter of debating terrorist versus civilian, because that means we're just considering it from our point of view.

To the Arabs who celebrated 9/11, every single one of those 2,996 people killed were just as culpable in the atrocities they allege we perpetrate across the Middle East, as we believe Osama was in 9/11.

Let me be clear:  the people who celebrated thought the victims were terrorists.  We see Osama as a terrorist.  From both sides:  terrorist dead, celebrate.

[Mars]

Yes; we've killed civilians to, but its not something we generally celebrate. No we're not doing much better than Osama in that sense, but that's another discussion.

What we were discussing here is the morality of celebrating Osama's death vs. celebrating 9/11.


Celebrating 9/11 would be like us celebrating the time Blackwater opened fire on all those civilians. I KNEW someone who did, and I thought he was a despicable person.

It's not a matter of debating terrorist versus civilian, because that means we're just considering it from our point of view.

To the Arabs who celebrated 9/11, every single one of those 2,996 people killed were just as culpable in the atrocities they allege we perpetrate across the Middle East, as we believe Osama was in 9/11.

Let me be clear:  the people who celebrated thought the victims were terrorists.  We see Osama as a terrorist.  From both sides:  terrorist dead, celebrate.

Thinking someone is guilty =/= them being guilty.

We know that Osama plotted those attacks.

The terrorists assumed that all of those people were guilty. They were only guilty of living their lives the way that they were allowed to.

[Scotty]

I smell a circle-jerk in this topic.  Progress is obviously being made.

[Nuclear1]

And what if evidence turned up that said Osama wasn't responsible for 9/11?  We would have celebrated and cheered over the wrong person.

We believe what we believe because the evidence we have says that we should hold certain people responsible.  The other side, in the same way, has their own evidence (no matter how wrong) that all Americans should be held responsible.

Again, you're looking at this purely from our perspective. 

I smell a circle-jerk in this topic.

I see two specific opposing sides.  Hardly a circlejerk.

[General Battuta]

I smell a circle-jerk in this topic.  Progress is obviously being made.

What is this I don't even, there are people arguing. A circlejerk occurs when everyone agrees.

[Mars]

And what if evidence turned up that said Osama wasn't responsible for 9/11?  We would have celebrated and cheered over the wrong person.

We believe what we believe because the evidence we have says that we should hold certain people responsible.  The other side, in the same way, has their own evidence (no matter how wrong) that all Americans should be held responsible.

Again, you're looking at this purely from our perspective. 

We have Osama Bin Laden, on tape, declaring himself responsible for 9/11. Unless you got a video of each and every one of the people killed in 9/11 claiming responsibility for the state of the Arab world, the situations are not comparable.

I'm NOT seeing it from their perspective, because they honestly don't have the ground to stand on. What actual evidence could they have of nearly 3,000 people's capability?

[General Battuta]

Well, we did elect the people who are (in their perception) responsible for the injustices visited upon them.

I don't really agree with them but I can see how they can be led to believe the US and all its citizens are an enemy.

[Nuclear1]

We have Osama Bin Laden, on tape, declaring himself responsible for 9/11. Unless you got a video of each and every one of the people killed in 9/11 claiming responsibility for the state of the Arab world, the situations are not comparable.

Again, that's the evidence we're presented.  The Arabs who cheered 9/11 have their own evidence to believe that all Americans are responsible for 9/11 (again, no matter how wrong it is):  oil companies drilling in Saudi Arabia, Americans cheering for Israel, military personnel on sacred soil, rednecks hating Muslims...

For the same reason Timothy McVeigh could look at the FBI and ATF raid on Waco and then bomb a government facility in Oklahoma City, a building with people who likely had nothing to do with Waco, simply because it belonged to the agency that carried out what he believed to be a horrible act, the Arabs who cheered 9/11 see any American dead as justice for what they believe other Americans did.

They didn't distinguish between the people who actually committed those atrocities and the rest of the people who happened to share the nationality.  Either way, it's still bloodlust and a drive for vengeance, and each side sees themselves as justified.

[Mars]

We have Osama Bin Laden, on tape, declaring himself responsible for 9/11. Unless you got a video of each and every one of the people killed in 9/11 claiming responsibility for the state of the Arab world, the situations are not comparable.

Again, that's the evidence we're presented.  The Arabs who cheered 9/11 have their own evidence to believe that all Americans are responsible for 9/11 (again, no matter how wrong it is):  oil companies drilling in Saudi Arabia, Americans cheering for Israel, military personnel on sacred soil, rednecks hating Muslims...

For the same reason Timothy McVeigh could look at the FBI and ATF raid on Waco and then bomb a government facility in Oklahoma City, a building with people who likely had nothing to do with Waco, simply because it belonged to the agency that carried out what he believed to be a horrible act, the Arabs who cheered 9/11 see any American dead as justice for what they believe other Americans did.

They didn't distinguish between the people who actually committed those atrocities and the rest of the people who happened to share the nationality.  Either way, it's still bloodlust and a drive for vengeance, and each side sees themselves as justified.

Belief =/= actual justification.

[Nuclear1]

Not really that much of a stretch.  If a few believe a certain way, what's to say everyone else (or a very large majority) in that group don't believe the same?

Which is why McVeigh bombed OKC, why al-Qaeda attacked on 9/11 and some Arabs cheered, and why a lot of people in this country hate all Muslims.

[NGTM-1R]

The Arabs who hate the West believe they've waited years to get at the people who they believe have hurt them.  So, 9/11 happens, they cheer.

Osama bin Laden is not only an admitted figure in 9/11, but an admitted figure in terrorism in general, who claims to have played a major leadership role in an organization responsible for a great majority of "Islamic" terrorism against the US.

The majority people who died on 9/11 were, at worst, greedy, relatively few of them had any sort of leadership role, none of those killed in the major effort had raised a direct hand against the Middle East or directed others to do so.

If, and only if, we were discussing the attack on the Pentagon, would you have an actual equivalency. But encompassing the entire 9/11 attacks, it falls apart. Those who cheered it were willfully ignorant at best, and you may not excuse them on those grounds.


And your effort to use McVeigh as an equivalency is equally inept. You demand he make an eye for an eye, while at the same time claiming that a soldier for a soldier is justified in 9/11. Your argument is internally incoherent on this subject and at the least needs to be heavily refined.

[General Battuta]

You're missing the fact that he's discussing what the set of people who cheered for 9/11 believed, not making a moral argument.

[Mikes]

I believe it makes you less human if you cheer the death of another human being, as a matter of principle.


Fight your enemies? Of course. Be relived when you prevail? Sure. Be glad when a conflict is solved? Certainly,... I would say solving a conflict IS a cause for celebration -
but this conflict is far from solved, the organisation responsible for the conflict is still intact and if anything, then Osama's death + the cheering of the idiot masses act as a huge proverbial stinky finger, but little else. Couldn't think of a better way to motivate the bad guys into hurting more people frankly... :/

[redsniper]

Bin Laden was a bad dude. I'm glad he's dead and the world is a better place without him. However, like a lot of others have said in here, it doesn't seem right to be joyful over a man's death. We should strive to make a world where we don't need to kill anyone in the first place.

[Nuclear1]

And your effort to use McVeigh as an equivalency is equally inept. You demand he make an eye for an eye, while at the same time claiming that a soldier for a soldier is justified in 9/11. Your argument is internally incoherent on this subject and at the least needs to be heavily refined.

I'm not sure I understand what you're saying here.

[NGTM-1R]

You're missing the fact that he's discussing what the set of people who cheered for 9/11 believed, not making a moral argument.

You're missing the fact that their believing it is in itself a moral argument in the day of smartphones and the internet. We have ample proof at hand that the day of simply buying whatever bull**** the government put out is (and has been for a long time) over in the Arab world, that these are technically savvy people capable of informing themselves about the shape of the world even in the dusty back-streets of Islamabad or Riyadh. If they truly believe what is claimed, they are doing so because that is what they wish to believe and they have rejected all evidence to the contrary despite having a great deal of it at their fingertips. It renders them morally and socially reprehensible by default.

For that matter, he is directly equating knowledge and ignorance as being morally equivalent. He himself has said so; "Either way, it's still bloodlust and a drive for vengeance, and each side sees themselves as justified."

I care not whether they see themselves as justified, and neither should anyone else. Seeing one's self as being justified says nothing about actual justification.

I'm not sure I understand what you're saying here.

Quite simply: you criticize McVeigh for not attacking the people directly responsible. But McVeigh managed to at least attacking the correct mechanisms that make such things as he was upset about possible. The same cannot be said of 9/11. It is at least a red herring in your argument.

[General Battuta]

You're missing the fact that their believing it is in itself a moral argument in the day of smartphones and the internet. We have ample proof at hand that the day of simply buying whatever bull**** the government put out is (and has been for a long time) over in the Arab world, that these are technically savvy people capable of informing themselves about the shape of the world even in the dusty back-streets of Islamabad or Riyadh. If they truly believe what is claimed, they are doing so because that is what they wish to believe and they have rejected all evidence to the contrary despite having a great deal of it at their fingertips. It renders them morally and socially reprehensible by default.

Arguing that because people have access to all the same information you do then they must reach the same conclusions you do is, psychologically, about the dumbest thing ever. Especially when your argument pertains to a tiny minority of the population in question.

Arguments that the truth is ours and the lies are theirs are all basically worth dismissing offhand.

I care not whether they see themselves as justified, and neither should anyone else. Seeing one's self as being justified says nothing about actual justification.

Well, it's just about the only justification any of us have access to. I don't think anyone can speak to 'actual justification', whatever that might be. Personally I feel our justification is a lot better than their justification, but I suspect we all do, no matter who we are.

I'm not sure I understand what you're saying here.

Quite simply: you criticize McVeigh for not attacking the people directly responsible. But McVeigh managed to at least attacking the correct mechanisms that make such things as he was upset about possible. The same cannot be said of 9/11. It is at least a red herring in your argument.

As a terror attack 9/11 seems to have struck the mechanisms of power pretty thoroughly. We all live in more fear than we did beforehand, and I think it's hard to deny the attack carried out its objectives - the subsequent ten years panned out in a manner that could hardly have been more ideal for bin Laden.