3 ms·
First off, I do have family in the region. Secondly, I completely agree with you that the article is a little strange. My first impression was that it doesn't
by rootw0rm 4y ago
First off, I do have family in the region.
Secondly, I completely agree with you that the article is a little strange. My first impression was that it doesn't really matter how 'ancient' the hatred is. The facts on the ground is that the hatred is very real today, and so embedded in the culture that it's not going anywhere.
I like academic arguments, but this one just doesn't seem to serve anyone. I admit that's possibly because I'm a bit biased to the situation.
- impossiblefork 4y agoI have nothing to do with the region myself, I'm a Swede, but even I know that places like this (https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e3/Ani_seen_from_Armenia.jpg https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e3/Ani_seen...) were once great cities and that they aren't depopulated for no reason-- and these places, it's a huge region in what is now Turkey. Expansionism, while repulsive, is perhaps comprehensible as greed, but to then go after the remainder, those three million who have survived up in the mountains, that is not comprehensible.
- ethanbond 4y agoWhy it’s perfectly comprehensible when you have the special book and your neighbors do not. Then your atrocities are merely expressions of god’s will.
- g8oz 4y agoAlways eye-rolling when those from the West - the same West that pillaged and depoulated entire continents argue that violence is an intrinsic characteristic of another group.
- saiya-jin 4y agoalways eye-rolling when people degrade discussion by throwing people into few simplistic categories which don't represent reality (ie there are tons of western countries these days, only few participated in colonization, slavery etc. and muslim ones participated during that time too)
- nivertech 4y agoThese are the only Western European countries which didn't participated in colonization/empire building: Vatican* (questionable) Malta (but not Sovereign Military Order of Malta) Monaco San Marino Andorra Liechtenstein Luxembourg Switzerland Ireland** (only after independence from UK) Under some classifications Scandinavia is also counts as Western Europe, and even there Denmark-Norway colonized Iceland and Greenland, and Sweden expanded its empire into Finland, Baltics and Northern Russia.
- galangalalgol 4y agoI read it as a generalization that included the west, the far east, pretty much anywhere our extended group of cousins has been able to survive. And we are all cousins. But apparently much like you shouldn't have a kid with your 1st cousin. It is for some reason very important to kill anyone further out than your 1000th or so. At least if they have something you want. Then our huge brains kick in and give us a good reason to do what we already wanted to. Often we write it in a book to make it more legitimate. Might be God told us, or we might come up with something scientific (interpreting data with a motive is super flexible) if we aren't feeling particularly religious.
- ethanbond 4y agoA lot of the west’s most atrocious actions were also validated by their special books. It’s a good thing that as the west developed god-like military/industrial power, it also went through some serious reformations in its belief systems.
- bregma 4y agoOdd how God's will always turns out to be human greed or human lust for power in the end. I think the original thesis stands.
- ethanbond 4y agoYeah don’t worry, I don’t think this is the actual desire of any actual god. But that doesn’t mean religion is irrelevant to how you get so many people with very little to gain to sacrifice their lives and/or humanity for someone else’s greed/lust for power.
- alexvoda 4y agoIt is much mure than that. Greed and lust for power are only motivators as long as it is profitable. Ideology goes way beyond and can motivate extreme hatred. Because ideology can turn a non-issue or a minor issue into an existential threat in the mind of the believers.