A Free Libya

[SportMonkey]

It looks like a great day for the people of Libya...

Anyone else watching the reincarnation of Baghdad Bob?

 

[dellzeqq]

it may be a better day than any recent day, but, given that the opposition is full of people who worked for Gaddafi.......

 

[accountantpete]

Someone has to come up with a viable model for these Middle Eastern "states " to work towards. Simply getting independence and introducing reforms is not going to work.

 

[vernon]

Someone has to come up with a viable model for these Middle Eastern "states " to work towards. Simply getting independence and introducing reforms is not going to work.

A wonderful aspiration.

The problem is that western democracy operates on different lines to tribal dominated cultures and mediation/compromise is nigh on impossible to achieve and/or maintain.

 

[XmisterIS]

Personally, I think the whole lot will throw the baby out with the bath water and become fundamentalist Islamic states. Invariably, the aftermath of revolution and civil war is at least as bad if not worse than what went before. For example:

The English Civil War - resulted in a Puritanical dictatorship, even Christmas was banned.

The French Revolution - resulted in mass executions and a dictatorship.

Then there's the Russian Revolution, the Spanish Civil War, etc, etc

 

[rich p]

We used to have Islamic states that weren't fundamentalist. Is that possible for a 'new' old state?

 

[Stephenite]

Just watching the BBC...

I know John Turturro gets about a bit but what on earth is he doing in Tripoli?

 

[XmisterIS]

The way the trend seems to have gone over the last few hundred years, I doubt it!

Back at the time of the crusades, the Islamic world was more civilized than us Europeans - Constantinople was a busy, advanced Islamic city in which art, literature, learning and open-mindedness flourished. Unfortunately, it was sacked by a bunch of mostly illiterate, half-educated, superstitious, bloodthirsty and incredibly brutal Christians from Europe!

Today, however, the boot is on the other foot.

The best course of action would be to divest ourselves of the need for fossil fuels, thereby ending our dependence on the Gulf states and Russia for our civilization.

If we ploughed money into renewable energy research and promotion as a top priority, we would rapidly lead the world in that field and everyone would reap the benefits for years to come. Unfortunately, despite the rhetoric, it would seem that the Govt. is actually keen to suppress and thwart renewable energy as much as possible because they're in the pay of the meganational corporations, and they're only interested in one thing: M-O-N-E-Y. They will truly burn in hell.

 

[Mad at urage]

Back at the time of the crusades, the Islamic world was more civilized than us Europeans - Constantinople was a busy, advanced Islamic city in which art, literature, learning and open-mindedness flourished. Unfortunately, it was sacked by a bunch of mostly illiterate, half-educated, superstitious, bloodthirsty and incredibly brutal Christians from Europe!

Which had never been called Byzantium nor captured from an enlightened learned and advanced Eastern Catholic church

 

[XmisterIS]

Which had never been called Byzantium nor captured from an enlightened learned and advanced Eastern Catholic church

Lol! Good point ...

 

[growingvegetables]

Which had never been called Byzantium nor captured from an enlightened learned and advanced Eastern Catholic church

History lesson ------ nor sacked by a bunch of ******* barbarians, ooops, sorry, the Fourth Crusade, an alliance of western "christian" forces, who sacked the city in 1204.

• By the time of the Ottoman siege and capture of Byzantium in 1453, it was the merest rump - a pimple on the bum of what had been the Eastern Empire, and a tenth of the size of the city sacked by the Fourth Crusade.
• It is at least arguable that the the citizens of Constantinople were treated better by the Ottomans than they had been in 1204.
• And the west panicked - xenophobia was as alive and well then, as it is now.

 

[Mad at urage]

Aye, history is complex and full of people misunderstanding each other. Probably not the forum (or thread) for a history of The Crusades (even if limited to those in the eastern med)?

TBH whilst we can learn from history, the ability to learn from more recent history might have to be acquired before we can start looking at 'Who started it? Who invaded whose civilization first? Who were nasty expansionist barbarians and who was defending the culture they now identified with?'. Although 'Why it always went wrong' might be the first lesson from ancient history.

More easily learned might be some lessons from how the West has tried to impose 'Democracy' since we acquired a taste for it, on nation states who do not share the history and assumptions which caused us to develop our version. Is even the nation state really relevant to people outside of old Europe (and our surviving colonies)?

 

[Stephenite]

There's a guy at work who asks me about football because, i assume, i come from England and Manchester (to boot!). I thought i'd turn the tables on him and ask him what is happening in Libya. I wish i hadn't. He went on about foreign intervention, oil, blah, blah, etc. But left me with a cracker.

He said, "In my country, Iraq, we have a saying. If there is two fish fighting in the water, you know that the British are behind it."

It was so funny I couldn't answer.

 

[Globalti]

Now the lid is off Pandora's box, watch the real fighting begin. The same will happen eventually in Syria where I have good Christian friends; I fear for their future.

 

[earth]

All those people rebelling and smashing the place up. If people did that here they would get locked up!