Obama is smooth...

[mildcigar_2001]

You are ignoring the burdens and legacies of history.

The poor bastards never really had a chance.

I think your arguments buttress my main point that culture does make a difference. Even as screwed up as the Spanish colonies were, the French were worse. I lived in Puerto Rico for a few years, and was able to travel around the Caribbean a fair bit and I noticed a big difference in the islands based on who their former colonial masters were. As a general rule, you were a lot better off if the Union Jack had been flying over your island. Culture matters.

Not that anyone would want to go to the trouble, but Haiti would be far better off if is became some country's colony. As Haiti sits now it is hell on earth for the most part. The recent earthquake of a couple of years ago is a good example of the poor organization of the people/government. There were thousands of people just sitting in temporary camps waiting for someone from the UN to fix their country. If there were any sort of proper leadership, those thousands would have been actively engaged in clearing the rubble and rebuilding. As it is most are sitting on their collective asses.

[Prospero]

I think mildcigar you are describing differences in attitude and colonial behaviour. I don't think that - by and large - Spain France and the UK would be considered different civilisations. And cultural differences there certainly are - but I don't think you can privilege one over the other. Muslim culture, Hindu culture. Christian culture. All different but with vast areas of common ground too. None better or worse. just different.

[runningdownthatdream]

I think your arguments buttress my main point that culture does make a difference. Even as screwed up as the Spanish colonies were, the French were worse. I lived in Puerto Rico for a few years, and was able to travel around the Caribbean a fair bit and I noticed a big difference in the islands based on who their former colonial masters were. As a general rule, you were a lot better off if the Union Jack had been flying over your island. Culture matters.

Not that anyone would want to go to the trouble, but Haiti would be far better off if is became some country's colony. As Haiti sits now it is hell on earth for the most part. The recent earthquake of a couple of years ago is a good example of the poor organization of the people/government. There were thousands of people just sitting in temporary camps waiting for someone from the UN to fix their country. If there were any sort of proper leadership, those thousands would have been actively engaged in clearing the rubble and rebuilding. As it is most are sitting on their collective asses.

Black people had independent thought and action wrenched from them through fear in the New World. They're sitting on their collective ass because that's what the Europeans taught them to do - follow orders. Hence if no-one is giving orders they don't know what to do. Slavery will do that. It dehumanizes, destroys instincts, and enforces submission through violence and the threat of violence. It also disrupted the family structure for generations - look at the mess black people are in wherever they were enslaved - and 'emancipating' slaves doesn't automatically bring back all those traditions nor the attendant instincts. The legacy of the colonizers and slavers is this. Most people from former colonies are too busy thinking about how to eat and where to live to think about WHY they are in the situation they are in.

You are a fool. I'm sure that in the typical way of a fool you will continue to present the garbage you're presenting in this thread under the guise of reason. Like the other jackass you don't want to look at the past to understand the present and you seem to think social ills just sprang from race and/or culture. In your inept way you have partly got it right - culture is to blame. But ask yourself this fool: WHO created the culture?

[buttslinger]

The Democrats here tried to send a strong message to "poor people" about their party but it flopped. It seems that poor people don't think of themselves as poor, they think of themselves as "working people"
The USA don't have no slaves. We have a lower class stuck on an economic treadmill where everything WE give them, WE take back, one way or another.

[mildcigar_2001]

Black people had independent thought and action wrenched from them through fear in the New World. They're sitting on their collective ass because that's what the Europeans taught them to do - follow orders. Hence if no-one is giving orders they don't know what to do. Slavery will do that. It dehumanizes, destroys instincts, and enforces submission through violence and the threat of violence. It also disrupted the family structure for generations - look at the mess black people are in wherever they were enslaved - and 'emancipating' slaves doesn't automatically bring back all those traditions nor the attendant instincts. The legacy of the colonizers and slavers is this. Most people from former colonies are too busy thinking about how to eat and where to live to think about WHY they are in the situation they are in.

You are a fool. I'm sure that in the typical way of a fool you will continue to present the garbage you're presenting in this thread under the guise of reason. Like the other jackass you don't want to look at the past to understand the present and you seem to think social ills just sprang from race and/or culture. In your inept way you have partly got it right - culture is to blame. But ask yourself this fool: WHO created the culture?

It is somewhat difficult to debate someone who doesn't understand even simple terms such as culture. For humans culture is almost all consuming.

A basic definition:

Culture consists of the beliefs, behaviors, objects, and other characteristics common to the members of a particular group or society. Through culture, people and groups define themselves, conform to society's shared values, and contribute to society. Thus, culture includes many societal aspects: language, customs, values, norms, mores, rules, tools, technologies, products, organizations, and institutions. This latter term institution refers to clusters of rules and cultural meanings associated with specific social activities. Common institutions are the family, education, religion, work, and health care.

It is obvious the the term culture would include the history that produced that culture.

It is a politically incorrect fact but a large number of countries that were former colonies were a lot better off with the colonial masters back in charge. A case in point is Rhodesia which once was the breadbasket of Africa can not even feed itself.

A love people who continue to whine and cry about slavery even after almost 150 years in the U.S. and almost 200 years in Haiti. It is an unhappy legacy but we need to move beyond it. My own ancestors were little more than serfs in europe when they immigrated in the 19th century, and I don't feel the need to blame the remote past for my current economic circumstances. The desendants of slaves need to man up and put their big boy pants on, and quit making excuses for themselves. Slavery flourished for several millienum throughout most of the world, most of the world has been able to move beyond its legacy, so too should the blacks.

[tiramisu]

No comment

[buttslinger]

[QUOTE=mildcigar_2001;1129292]My own ancestors were little more than serfs in europe when they immigrated in the 19th century,

I thought you said 1636.

It is an unhappy legacy but we need to move beyond it.

That's what we're trying to tell you.

[mildcigar_2001]

A little something to wash down the dog.

Malt liquor reviews:

http://www.joegrossberg.com/archives/000163.html

[trish]

Still no explanation from the racist why eating dog makes one morally inferior. I see you know how to avoid a question, but you certainly don't know how to answer one.

[buttslinger]

"And it's not surprising then that they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-black sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations," Obama said.