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think positive 
Side By Side
Joined: 30 Jun 2005
Location: somewhere
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| stui magpie wrote: | | David wrote: |
Astonishing how national-security rhetoric turns the journalistic revelation of government spying (perhaps on its own citizens) into a harmful act that must be punished. Is our loyalty to the public interest, or to making sure that state power operates as smoothly as possible? Surely only those who think government power is good and can always be trusted, and that nothing that is done behind the scenes is the public's business, could swallow that logic. Such people want to live in a dictatorship. |
No where near is it that black and white.
I certainly don't think government power is always good and can always be trusted, I also know that sometimes they need to do bad things for the greater good and the "public interest" test of total transparency just doesn't work.
When countries are at war, whether that be literally, metaphorically or economically, they go to great lengths to ensure their enemy doesn't get inside knowledge which means they can't be transparent to their own people.
IIRC Assange's revelations didn't save any lives but did put some in jeopardy, all in the name of the public need to know what's going on. What serves the public interest better, the government doing what it was elected to do or facing scrutiny of their every action in trying to do the former?
He's no hero, but he may not be a villain either |
Exactly right. He must have known the potential consequences
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You cant fix stupid, turns out you cant quarantine it either! |
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David
I dare you to try
Joined: 27 Jul 2003
Location: Andromeda
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| think positive wrote: | | David wrote: | I don't think the US is evil. I actually think it's a pretty normal superpower, full of the same old corruption, authoritarianism, arrogance and a startling (but not unusual) lack of regard for human life or the sovereignty of other countries.
As for Assange's wealth, to my knowledge, the guy often lived on the road in hotel rooms or slept on friends' couches when he was still a free man. I think it's pretty likely that none of this was done for material gain, and that any money was filtered straight back into Wikileaks or legal bills. None of his family members are rich. But why even make an accusation like that if you don't have any evidence that it's true? |
Accusation? I asked the question, and it is very relevant. It shows his intent. You think it’s likely? You know him that well? Pretty big assumption. |
Your exact words were "I believe his free speech thing was for his own financial gain". That's not a question, is it? As for what I know about him, I'm only going off the various books and news reports about his work with Wikileaks that I've come across over the years. I also know someone who knows his dad, and what I've heard from them only strengthens my perception that nobody's making a buck from this. But I also believe in the basic principle of not assuming the worst about people without evidence.
| stui magpie wrote: | | What serves the public interest better, the government doing what it was elected to do or facing scrutiny of their every action in trying to do the former? |
I think the really eye-opening thing revealed by the Wikileaks files and, in particular, the Snowden leaks, is just how much government institutions do that they are not elected to do. In the latter instance, before the Snowden revelations proved it to be the case, Obama flat-out denied that the NSA was spying on American citizens when asked about it, which either suggests that he was lying or that this huge, powerful security agency were operating without his authorisation – either of which would be pretty alarmingly undemocratic. Likewise, even those voters who supported the Iraq War had no idea about many of the things that were being done in their names, including the deaths of journalists being covered up and dead civilians being described as combatants in military reports.
Ultimately, it really does come down to a single question: how much should you trust your government? And how much of a democracy do you live in if they will deliberately hide what they're doing from you – not for your own good, but because if you found out it would make them look bad? And even if you think some things need to be kept secret for our own good, how will you know when things slip into the latter category, and what authority is going to stop that from happening? Countries like Australia that have passed laws criminalising journalism about 'national-security' matters have already removed the possibility of oversight, which means that they've also removed accountability.
There's a lot of distracting debate about whether or not Assange is technically a journalist. It's distracting because it obscures a basic fact: the entire purpose of journalism, if you actually believe in it as a democratic institution and not just a mouthpiece for government propaganda, celebrity gossip and pictures of cute animals, is about the tension between power and information. If you're a good political journalist, your whole purpose is to reveal things that the government doesn't want the public to know. That's not a niche aspect of your job; it is your job.
Whatever you think of the Wikileaks project or Assange specifically, the website provided a rare defence of that process in an age of mass surveillance and draconian national-security legislation: it served as a tool for whistleblowers to safely leak evidence of corruption without having their identities revealed – the sort of thing that every investigative journalist since the invention of the printing press has been trying to do when they protect sources' identities. That's a confidence that they can now be legally compelled to breach, as has happened in the recent raids of News Corp and the ABC. The Wikileaks project was all about preserving that security and giving sources and journalists a back door, and a near-unstoppable way of getting information out to the public. If you want to know why Assange has such a huge target on his head, that's probably a good start.
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All watched over by machines of loving grace |
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think positive
Side By Side
Joined: 30 Jun 2005
Location: somewhere
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man your second paragraph has me worried about another branch Davidians Waco standoff! maybe its the name!
the bit about the government not wanting you to know, as Stui pointed out, maybe its not so much that, but the fact that info could help our enemies. im sure there is some truth to "24" but for me it was all about Kiefer saving the day. again!!
anyhow, i respect your view, ill keep mine, what will be will be, theres plenty of people standing up for him, he wont miss me! cheers
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You cant fix stupid, turns out you cant quarantine it either! |
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bokka 
Joined: 11 Apr 1999
Location: NY, Ex Land of Brave and Free
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| Post subject: Re: Getting Sick of Collingwood Forums | |
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| RudeBoy wrote: | | bokka wrote: | | Dave The Man wrote: | I am getting Sick of the Collingwood Forums on the Internet as there always seems to be Civil Warfare on the.
Any Negative Fans get Abused by the Positive Fans for not Being Real Fans.
Really makes me hate to be on these Boards as always seem Down on there.
I am barley using Nicks anymore and I am starting to think I will do the Same with Bigfooty as well.
Can't stand up to Smartass's without getting in Trouble.
Getting Really Sick Of It |
STicks and stones, DAve. Freedom of speech means accepting other people's right to say really annoying stuff.
I came back to Nick's after bigfooty deleted my avatar because it is anti-Israel - tjhat disgusting psycho aparthied little fake country. I'm sure they wouldn't have deleted an avatar that was anti south african apartheid even though that wasn't even a fraction as bad and murderous as Isreal's treatment of Palestinians.
so anyway bigfooty squashed my freedom of expression and that's not acceptable - so I have to commit to allowing others to say stuff I don't like. Sometimes can degenerate into a shit fight but I try to stay calm and polite. I still post there a bit though but it's a lot mroe feral than here. |
I'm with you 100% on apartheid Israel bokka. I spent some time in occupied Palestine earlier this year and what the Zionist/Fascist forces are doing there is disgusting..........but this is a footy forum so perhaps not the right place for such discussions.  |
RB I was jsut mentioning it to explain my situation with bigfooty and their censorship. But a zionist poster made an issue out of it and I'm not going to stand by and let people promote a disgusting country like Israel.
That would be like implicitly supporting them and one of the sig's in this forum has an admirable Assange quote that's very relevant something like "every time we fail to respond to oppression we are training ourselves to be passive". And every time a zionist bully silences you out of fear of being called "antisemitic" (which now is virtually the same as being anti Israel) he is mentally enslaving you, and he knows it and gloats. |
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David
I dare you to try
Joined: 27 Jul 2003
Location: Andromeda
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Some gobsmacking hypocrisy by the UK Foreign Office in the video below:
https://twitter.com/foreignoffice/status/1176893730210680833
I guess this shows why it's so important for them to keep repeating the line that Julian Assange isn't a journalist. Must be some serious cognitive dissonance going on over there.
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All watched over by machines of loving grace |
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bokka
Joined: 11 Apr 1999
Location: NY, Ex Land of Brave and Free
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| stui magpie wrote: | Personally I'm Pro-Israel. I may not agree with everything they do but I also don't agree with the way the Palestinians approach things.
Having said that, if someone wants to have an avatar that says phuk Israel or the USA, meh. DILLIGAF.
Too many people these days are far too readily offended. I'd rather put that energy into something more meaningful. Sometimes I get wound up about something, but rarely.Badgering people who disagree with your opinion is an abject waste of time and energy unless that's where you get your Dopamine hit from. |
Do you also wish South Africa was still apartheid.
For yoru information Israel's apartheid is infinitley worse aned more brutal than South Africa. One of S Africa's worst and most infamous atrocities was opening fire on a black protest killing 30 people. Israel kills that many if not mroe every month, and every now and then have a vicious military atack on GAza murdering thousands, including bombing schools and hospitals, while Israelis sit on hilltops with binoculars from afar to enjoy teh sport.
<snip – "Zionist" conspiracy theories have no place here. Thanks, David for BBMods.> |
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stui magpie 
Prepare for the worst, hope for the best.
Joined: 03 May 2005
Location: In flagrante delicto
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No I don't wish Sth Africa was still Apartheid. I don't know why you use that term to describe Israel, their Muslim neighbors are as equally determined to destroy them as Israel is to survive. Yeah, they go too far sometimes, I guess being surrounded by people who want to kill you, for decades, can make people do things.
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Every dead body on Mt Everest was once a highly motivated person, so maybe just calm the **** down. |
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watt price tully 
Joined: 15 May 2007
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| bokka wrote: | | stui magpie wrote: | Personally I'm Pro-Israel. I may not agree with everything they do but I also don't agree with the way the Palestinians approach things.
Having said that, if someone wants to have an avatar that says phuk Israel or the USA, meh. DILLIGAF.
Too many people these days are far too readily offended. I'd rather put that energy into something more meaningful. Sometimes I get wound up about something, but rarely.Badgering people who disagree with your opinion is an abject waste of time and energy unless that's where you get your Dopamine hit from. |
Do you also wish South Africa was still apartheid.
For yoru information Israel's apartheid is infinitley worse aned more brutal than South Africa. One of S Africa's worst and most infamous atrocities was opening fire on a black protest killing 30 people. Israel kills that many if not mroe every month, and every now and then have a vicious military atack on GAza murdering thousands, including bombing schools and hospitals, while Israelis sit on hilltops with binoculars from afar to enjoy teh sport.
It's horrifying to see how easily the sheeple's attitudes are manipulated by our zionist masters. PC snowflake fake morality is the modern "religion" that is engineered from above to morally bully the masses, and get chosen sections fo teh population (eg women, gays, non-whites) to play the victim and act as the elite's unpaid moral police.
and it all starts with compulsory schooling to create dependent conformist citizens but of course feed them with illusions of independence and free-thinking.
the human race is in a terrible state. |
Everyone is free to have an opinion including wrong ones. Using emotive terms to reduce complex issues to simplistic slogans can be self satisfying: so too is masturbating. In the end it doesn’t shed any light just a bit of uniformed heat.
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“I even went as far as becoming a Southern Baptist until I realised they didn’t keep ‘em under long enough” Kinky Friedman |
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watt price tully
Joined: 15 May 2007
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| stui magpie wrote: | | No I don't wish Sth Africa was still Apartheid. I don't know why you use that term to describe Israel, their Muslim neighbors are as equally determined to destroy them as Israel is to survive. Yeah, they go too far sometimes, I guess being surrounded by people who want to kill you, for decades, can make people do things. |
Fascist 😉
Don’t you know sloganeering always trumps rational discourse 🙄
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“I even went as far as becoming a Southern Baptist until I realised they didn’t keep ‘em under long enough” Kinky Friedman |
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RudeBoy
Joined: 28 Nov 2005
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| stui magpie wrote: | | No I don't wish Sth Africa was still Apartheid. I don't know why you use that term to describe Israel, their Muslim neighbors are as equally determined to destroy them as Israel is to survive. Yeah, they go too far sometimes, I guess being surrounded by people who want to kill you, for decades, can make people do things. |
Stui, don't you understand that Israel is simply a European Colonialist regime, which forcibly took over Palestine and drove 250,000 Palestinians out of their homes and off their land, firstly in 1948, and then with an expansionist land grab in 1967, and more and more ever since? I was in occupied Palestine - Hebron, Ramallah, Bethlehem - only recently and saw groups of Israeli teenage thugs, strolling around Palestinian areas with machine guns (as they are allowed and are encouraged to do by the Israeli Government) slung over their shoulders, intimidating and humiliating the Palestinians. All Palestinian towns and communities are surrounded by Israeli army posts, and Palestinians are frisked and humiliated whenever they move from town to town. Quite simply, Zionism is modern day Fascism plain and simple. |
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watt price tully
Joined: 15 May 2007
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| RudeBoy wrote: | | stui magpie wrote: | | No I don't wish Sth Africa was still Apartheid. I don't know why you use that term to describe Israel, their Muslim neighbors are as equally determined to destroy them as Israel is to survive. Yeah, they go too far sometimes, I guess being surrounded by people who want to kill you, for decades, can make people do things. |
Stui, don't you understand that Israel is simply a European Colonialist regime, which forcibly took over Palestine and drove 250,000 Palestinians out of their homes and off their land, firstly in 1948, and then with an expansionist land grab in 1967, and more and more ever since? ...... |
The details can be argued. You omitted to mention that Arab armies started a war when Israel was made an Independent country in 1948 and lost. The consequences of losing a war is always borne the hardest by civilians and mostly by the losing sides
In 1967 in what you called a land grab you omitted some basic facts: The Arabs started another war to "push the Jews into the sea" (of course now the slogan is from the west bank to the sea) and lost the 6 day war. Israels mistake was to become overlords and start settlements rather than return what they won in a war of survival.
You should also mention that Gaza & the West bank. You omittted to mention that they were run by Egypt and Jordan respectively from 1948-1967 but details details....
The Arab countries chose war & chose not to recognise Israel. They chose poorly. They lost and civilians were as in any war the casualties.
At the same time: 850,000 Jews were booted out of: Egypt, Syria, Yemen, Tunisia, Iraq.amidst muder, pogroms etc of jews in Arab lands who until Perstroika and Glasnost represented the vast majority of jews in Israel.
Colonial project? Yes the mighty imperialist nation of ..... who exactly? I know it doesn’t fit but let’s loosen up the definition to make it fit....
As to Hebron you should tell us about the 1929 massacre....
There are examples on both and all sides to entrench ones view
As for todays occupation: I want to give it all back but the Arabs in the repsective areas will have to disarm. Personally, I’d put the fundamentalist nutters of all sides ( there’s more than 2) in Gaza and let those who want to live together in the rest of the area.
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“I even went as far as becoming a Southern Baptist until I realised they didn’t keep ‘em under long enough” Kinky Friedman
Last edited by watt price tully on Sun Sep 29, 2019 1:22 am; edited 1 time in total |
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bokka
Joined: 11 Apr 1999
Location: NY, Ex Land of Brave and Free
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The main Arab "fundamentalist nutters" are based in Saudi Arabia, a country set up by the British and heavily allied with Iarael. <snip>
AS for Arab countries coming to the aid of Palestine when they were brutally invaded, I suppse you also condemn Britain, the US and Australia for gong to war against Germany for invading and occupying other countries? |
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