How about a group hug? Just between us modern western democracies…all this doom and gloom is giving me gas.
The Cannucks have given us Pam Anderson…
jue faegoht
[QUOTE=Hebrew Hammer;890696]all this doom and gloom is giving me gas.[/QUOTE]it’s almost an ironic statement…
[QUOTE=Hebrew Hammer;890696]How about a group hug? Just between us modern western democracies…all this doom and gloom is giving me gas.
The Cannucks have given us Pam Anderson…[/QUOTE]
Let’s not forget Kristin Kreuk and Laura Vandervoort.
Or Mike Myers? Jim Carry? Martin Short? the Late John Candy? Lorne Michaels? …wait, this list will be too long.
I don’t see a problem with it.
[QUOTE=Ray Pina;890667]Its population is growing sick.
youth are exposed to thousands of murders on TV before they are 18. Yet, the culture is full of week men who neither grasp the realities nor consequences of violence because at the same time they’ve been sheltered.
The women are no longer feminine. The idea of being liberated mixed with joining the work force has made them more aggressive, because this is the trait that America rewards. Aggressive work habits, aggressive, actions and speech.
So now the family unit is out of balance.
Throw in tremendous consumerism, commercialism, insecurity… yup. America is not what it used to be. Not for some time.
Thank God the rest of the world is going to $hit too and has its head up its a$$, so it doesn’t seem so bad.[/QUOTE]Interesting… So you advocate a stagnent society? Why don’t you head on over to the middle east? That region is full of stagnant societies that haven’t made any advances in 500 to 600 years.
[QUOTE=Becca;890653]Influence is given, not forced. We don’t ask anyone to go along with our pop culter, and don’t perticularly care if you like it or not. We do. It’s ours. Don’t like non-Americans following our pop culture? Go rag on them.:rolleyes:[/QUOTE]
The first part is dead wrong. The US has used all sorts of means including economic sanctions to get corporate culture (Pepsi, Tobacco, cinema) into regions where it didn’t exist before.
The empire doesn’t just use military means to alter the global culture landscape. The sad thing is that many people have bought into it.
With the few exceptions, American culture, much like Canadian, in terms of media, is rubbish.
I’ve yet to see U.S. sanctions set up spacifically to force U.S. consumerism into closed markets. I have seen where the lifting of sancions put in place for other reasons have ushered in a flood of consumerism, but never has it been done to create the flood. It is also usually a two way flood, so to speek. The U.S. tends to be heavily influenced by our tradeing partners as well. The U.S. culture most people seem to detest isn’t a purely American thing any more, and hasn’t been since the end of WWII.
Are you suggesting that the religious fundamentalism on the upswell over the last decade in the USA is a syncretic responce to the involvement of the USA with countries like Saudi Arabia - where religious fundamentalism is common?
Yes, actually. Seeing others willing to kill us for our religious beliefs because thier religious beliefs tell them they need to has, indeed, rekindled may fudementalist groups. Given time and space, Americans tend to take the middle road and assume that everyone else is also on the middle road too. 9/11 forced many to rethink this belief. And the typical American knee jerk reaction is “If you are going to attack me for being christian, I’m going to be the best **** christian out there!”
See I find any sort of religious fundamentalism as a dangerous thing. The 9/11 excuse just doesn’t hold water for believing that you have a duty to bring about the rapture.
[QUOTE=Becca;890811]Yes, actually. Seeing others willing to kill us for our religious beliefs because thier religious beliefs tell them they need to has, indeed, rekindled may fudementalist groups. Given time and space, Americans tend to take the middle road and assume that everyone else is also on the middle road too. 9/11 forced many to rethink this belief. And the typical American knee jerk reaction is “If you are going to attack me for being christian, I’m going to be the best **** christian out there!”[/QUOTE]
Who tried to kill “you” because of your religious beliefs?
9/11 had nothing to do with religion, don’t fall into that convenient excuse.
Truth is that Al Quaeda did not target the USA for being Christian.
They targeted USA for being imperialist.
This doesn’t make what they do right… but it is why some of us have trouble buying that it’s a valid reason to run into the arms of fundamentalism.
well, the USA isnt christian anyways. a lot of it is, but there are a lot of us as well that are not.
[QUOTE=SimonM;890838]Truth is that Al Quaeda did not target the USA for being Christian.
They targeted USA for being imperialist.
This doesn’t make what they do right… but it is why some of us have trouble buying that it’s a valid reason to run into the arms of fundamentalism.[/QUOTE]
Uh…no. They targeted the USA because of our support for Israel.
They targeted us for supporting Israel
They also targeted us for being Christion and not “obeying the word of G’d”
They also targeted us for having troops in Saudi Arabia, their holy land
Like any fundamentalist, they are convinced they are right because they own the true words of G’d and that anything is acceptable because they are fighting those who dare disobey the word of G’d
All fundamentalists are teh same, it isn’t the religion, it’s the variation
[QUOTE=lkfmdc;890845]
All fundamentalists are teh same, it isn’t the religion, it’s the variation[/QUOTE]
Truth. 
[QUOTE=SimonM;890812]See I find any sort of religious fundamentalism as a dangerous thing. The 9/11 excuse just doesn’t hold water for believing that you have a duty to bring about the rapture.[/QUOTE]Who said it had to wold water to get a group of people to follw it, though… I imagine it would make perfect sence if your were a religious nut.
[QUOTE=sanjuro_ronin;890822]Who tried to kill “you” because of your religious beliefs?
9/11 had nothing to do with religion, don’t fall into that convenient excuse.[/QUOTE]
Since you seem to have missed the very obvoius point… “us” is the U.S. “We” as a society took that as a very personal hit, just as we took Pearl Harber as a personal hit. And that is enough of an excuse for those inclined to look for an excuse. I am not a bible thumper, but like every other human being, I have a tendancy to look for excuses. Much like you’d rather just blame and mis-trust Amrica for pretty much everything.:rolleyes: