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<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Fred187 @ Jan 9 2009, 03:10 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}></div>
Well what do you want me to say? Europe is disunited as a whole because it doesn't have one concurrent cultural connection of cause d'etiere. The Arab world however certainly does, specifically over Israel being there on what it envisions as its turf and general Western policy towards the region period. It tends to galvanise popular support across the Middle East.
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I think political disunity is good for Europe.
You slag me off about being pro-euro and all that, but my basic point is you should provide people with a fundamental system (currency, level market) and let them do whatever they want. Because people are mostly good, and they're much better than state employees (non-people) at figuring out what's wrong. [/b][/quote]
I'd say that statement is very debatable, as my good friend Danny is proving. I'd say the best way to measure what proportion of people are 'good' is to study Nazi Germany. Many of the people who come across as 'good' in our society are actually just sheep, and only seem good because, on the whole, our society is quite a good one - which means as soon as you turn that around, most people go with the flow (be it good or bad). Relatively few people are 'good' regardless. 'Heart of Darkness' pretty much covers all of this'.
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Interestingly, I recently saw a documentary (can't remember what it was called) covering people's "gang" mentality. It took 2 groups of very ordinary,everyday UK residents and set them certain challenges in which they would compete against each other. They didn't know they were being studied for this "pack behaviour" but consented to the release of the doc. once informed after filming. The groups were seperated according to eye colour.
Anyway, the long and short of it is that one team was artificially more succesful than the other (achieved by cunningly sabotaging the other teams efforts). A psychologist was planted in the successful group and easily managed to convince them that their eye colour was indicative of genetic superiority. They swalled it all and loved believing that they were superior. The scary thing is it was so easy to convince seemingly educated and friendly people.
This just shows how easy it was to convince many Germans of their "Aryan" superiority over the Jews, Slavs etc. in the 30's, and how easy it is now for, say the Jews in Israel to stereotype the Palestinians and dehumanise them in their own minds and thus "free" themselves of any ethical issues. I use this merely as an example and I'm not at all saying the Israeli's all do this, but one can be certain that individuals on both sides are easily convinced of their neighbour's "inferiority".
Well what do you want me to say? Europe is disunited as a whole because it doesn't have one concurrent cultural connection of cause d'etiere. The Arab world however certainly does, specifically over Israel being there on what it envisions as its turf and general Western policy towards the region period. It tends to galvanise popular support across the Middle East.
[/b][/quote]
I think political disunity is good for Europe.
You slag me off about being pro-euro and all that, but my basic point is you should provide people with a fundamental system (currency, level market) and let them do whatever they want. Because people are mostly good, and they're much better than state employees (non-people) at figuring out what's wrong. [/b][/quote]
I'd say that statement is very debatable, as my good friend Danny is proving. I'd say the best way to measure what proportion of people are 'good' is to study Nazi Germany. Many of the people who come across as 'good' in our society are actually just sheep, and only seem good because, on the whole, our society is quite a good one - which means as soon as you turn that around, most people go with the flow (be it good or bad). Relatively few people are 'good' regardless. 'Heart of Darkness' pretty much covers all of this'.
[/b][/quote]
Interestingly, I recently saw a documentary (can't remember what it was called) covering people's "gang" mentality. It took 2 groups of very ordinary,everyday UK residents and set them certain challenges in which they would compete against each other. They didn't know they were being studied for this "pack behaviour" but consented to the release of the doc. once informed after filming. The groups were seperated according to eye colour.
Anyway, the long and short of it is that one team was artificially more succesful than the other (achieved by cunningly sabotaging the other teams efforts). A psychologist was planted in the successful group and easily managed to convince them that their eye colour was indicative of genetic superiority. They swalled it all and loved believing that they were superior. The scary thing is it was so easy to convince seemingly educated and friendly people.
This just shows how easy it was to convince many Germans of their "Aryan" superiority over the Jews, Slavs etc. in the 30's, and how easy it is now for, say the Jews in Israel to stereotype the Palestinians and dehumanise them in their own minds and thus "free" themselves of any ethical issues. I use this merely as an example and I'm not at all saying the Israeli's all do this, but one can be certain that individuals on both sides are easily convinced of their neighbour's "inferiority".
