The Democrat Circus

[DangerBoy]

you see bradley it really wasn't that hard

[SolidLuigi]

McCain's own racism, shown in this quote he said himself "I hate gooks." He later backpedaled and said that he specifically meant his 2 prison guards, like any reasonable person would believe that. This is a disgusting quote in two ways. One, if he hadn't used the slang, it would be, "I hate Asians" which I don't need to explain why that would be wrong for him to say. Two, the fact that he used the slang in a statement of his own, shows his capacity and acceptance for racism, because he chose to use that word, he wasn't quoting someone else to make a point of how it's wrong like I am using it. So even if he truly had been talking specifically about those 2 guards, it'd still be racist and wrong because he is generalizing a whole race based on those 2 guards.

I would never vote for McCain for alot of reasons, but just so we are clear. If someone locks you and all your friends in a bamboo cage partially submerged is swamp water for two years, torturing you daily, feeding you just enough food to keep you alive, and randomly killing you friends, you might be justified in hating those people and the entire nation that condoned those activities.

So unless you are going to turn the tables and say that all those poor guys (no sarcasm) in Guantanimo and CIA camps around the world shouldn't hate the U.S. and all Americans, lets cut McCain some slack.

Keep the double standards to a minimum.

1. you can't accuse me of using a double-standard when I haven't said those guys in guantanimo shouldn't hate the US

2. No matter what has happened to someone to cause them hate a particular race, it is still racism. That being said, someone who is held as a prisoner by asians can certainly hate them all, everyone has a right to their beliefs. But when that person is running for President, I don't think racism is a good quality, no matter what influenced it. So since he is running for President, the leader of our country, no, I will not cut him some slack

No, what you've again failed to understand is that he was referring to "gooks" in the way that all US combat servicemen did in Indochina: that is, to describe their AVN and NLF enemy. If you can't understand this semantical subtelty, then not only should you "cut some slack" for this hero of both your country and the Cause of Freedom in the Glorious War against Communism and Social-Fascism, but you should shut the f*ck up.

Really simple, "Gooks" is a racist term. Someone whos running for president shouldn't use it. Let alone saying that they hate them, hate is such a strong word.

Napoleon, I'm drunk rigght now, cause it's 9:30pm on St. Patty's day, go get drunk, get laid, and get some common sense.

[Nobunaga]

... Obama's "magic aura" is thinning a bit, starting to unravel. That connection to the racist maniac is doing him some very real harm.

... I like Obama well enough but I cannot figure out where he gets off riding this wave of "poor black kid" who fought the good fight and rose above it all. I guess it's just so much politicking, I mean, the man hasn't spent a single day in the projects of Chicago unless he was there drumming up votes with a full contingent of well-armed bodyguards.

... McCain is no prize, I have to agree.

...

[Napoleon Ier]

McCain's own racism, shown in this quote he said himself "I hate gooks." He later backpedaled and said that he specifically meant his 2 prison guards, like any reasonable person would believe that. This is a disgusting quote in two ways. One, if he hadn't used the slang, it would be, "I hate Asians" which I don't need to explain why that would be wrong for him to say. Two, the fact that he used the slang in a statement of his own, shows his capacity and acceptance for racism, because he chose to use that word, he wasn't quoting someone else to make a point of how it's wrong like I am using it. So even if he truly had been talking specifically about those 2 guards, it'd still be racist and wrong because he is generalizing a whole race based on those 2 guards.

I would never vote for McCain for alot of reasons, but just so we are clear. If someone locks you and all your friends in a bamboo cage partially submerged is swamp water for two years, torturing you daily, feeding you just enough food to keep you alive, and randomly killing you friends, you might be justified in hating those people and the entire nation that condoned those activities.

So unless you are going to turn the tables and say that all those poor guys (no sarcasm) in Guantanimo and CIA camps around the world shouldn't hate the U.S. and all Americans, lets cut McCain some slack.

Keep the double standards to a minimum.

1. you can't accuse me of using a double-standard when I haven't said those guys in guantanimo shouldn't hate the US

2. No matter what has happened to someone to cause them hate a particular race, it is still racism. That being said, someone who is held as a prisoner by asians can certainly hate them all, everyone has a right to their beliefs. But when that person is running for President, I don't think racism is a good quality, no matter what influenced it. So since he is running for President, the leader of our country, no, I will not cut him some slack

No, what you've again failed to understand is that he was referring to "gooks" in the way that all US combat servicemen did in Indochina: that is, to describe their AVN and NLF enemy. If you can't understand this semantical subtelty, then not only should you "cut some slack" for this hero of both your country and the Cause of Freedom in the Glorious War against Communism and Social-Fascism, but you should shut the f*ck up.

Really simple, "Gooks" is a racist term. Someone whos running for president shouldn't use it. Let alone saying that they hate them, hate is such a strong word.

Napoleon, I'm drunk rigght now, cause it's 9:30pm on St. Patty's day, go get drunk, get laid, and get some common sense.

As I've already explained to you, it isn't a racist term at all. So why on earth do you continue to pathetically insist it is in the face of McCain's own explanation of the context in which he used it and its historical usage? Why so much prejudice against such a great man?

[Snorri1234]

As I've already explained to you, it isn't a racist term at all. So why on earth do you continue to pathetically insist it is in the face of McCain's own explanation of the context in which he used it and its historical usage? Why so much prejudice against such a great man?

Awesome. I dare you to go to any asian neighbourhood in the USA and call the people there "gooks".

[Napoleon Ier]

As I've already explained to you, it isn't a racist term at all. So why on earth do you continue to pathetically insist it is in the face of McCain's own explanation of the context in which he used it and its historical usage? Why so much prejudice against such a great man?

Awesome. I dare you to go to any asian neighbourhood in the USA and call the people there "gooks".

Awesome. I dare you to go to 'Nam and get captured and brutally tortured by NVA for half a decade nd feel no ill-will toward them.

[Snorri1234]

As I've already explained to you, it isn't a racist term at all. So why on earth do you continue to pathetically insist it is in the face of McCain's own explanation of the context in which he used it and its historical usage? Why so much prejudice against such a great man?

Awesome. I dare you to go to any asian neighbourhood in the USA and call the people there "gooks".

Awesome. I dare you to go to 'Nam and get captured and brutally tortured by NVA for half a decade nd feel no ill-will toward them.

This is not about whether torture is horrible or that it is understandable that McCain feels ill will, but about whether someone who casually insults an entire race is really fit to run for president.

But for giggles, let's analise your original post.

As I've already explained to you, it isn't a racist term at all.

It is very much a racist term. Just because you don't think it is doesn't mean it isn't.

So why on earth do you continue to pathetically insist it is in the face of McCain's own explanation of the context in which he used it and its historical usage?

Historical usage? You mean the historical meaning of it being a racist slur?
How does that make it better?

And the whole problem here is that it doesn't matter what context he thought he was placing it in, it's what people themselves saw as the context. The question SolidLuigi brings up is actually quite valid.

Is a man who is so obviously out of touch with the meaning of words fit to be a president in a time where China is becoming quite possibly the major economy and many asian countries are also prospering?
If this was 25 years ago it wouldn't really be an issue, but now you have to take into account foreign relations and the fact that the US can't pull anything they want anymore. Will it strain relations with, for example, china if the figurehead is known to insult asians?



However, I don't think this is a good reason to immediately say he's unfit. Any person might have a little shit on them, and McCain is no different.

I am more suprised that there hasn't been more of a shitstorm about this by his opponents. Maybe with him being a veteran and all that he gets less flack.

[Napoleon Ier]

No snorrarse, wrong again...a term is not inherently racist, it all depends on the context it was used, terms and their meanings evolve and vary from person to person, that much is painfully obvious. I like the example of the Miltonism "pain formidable" which later turns out to have been written by a French baker, but you can think of plenty of other examples which are more relevant. Perhaps McCain may say something is "gay" meaning "jolly, pleasant, good-humoured", and you certainly can't describe it as glaring homophobic prejudice (well, you'd find some way to construe it as such if it was McCain, I'm sure, but you take my point). So, looking at the semantics is the only way to fully appreciate what he meant. With me so far?

And your semantic interpretation (unless you've come to realise a "term" cannot of itself and in its essence "mean" anything absolute and rather, has purely subjective semantic connotations, realisation I'm not sure you have the intellectual maturity to accept) is that McCain meant he literally hated all Asian people. Why in the hell would say that? I'm sure McCain met some ARVN officers in Nam and was on good terms with them. Again, McCain said he had found surprising humanity in some of his captors. I mean, to suggest automatically that McCain hates all Asians is just plain silly.

Furthermore, the term "gooks" was in wide use to refer to AVN enemy amongst US forces in Nam. I wasn't used to describe ARVN, or South Korean battle groups. It described NVA and NLF forces. McCain deliberately specified it only reffered to his NVA captors (which should be clear anyway, but this great man's time was wasted by arrogant little arses like you, forcing him to issue this press release):

For 5 1/2 years, I was mistreated by Ho Chi Minh's henchmen. My fellow prisoners were treated even worse.

Although I will never forgive my prison guards for the atrocities they committed against my cellmates, I have always held the people of Vietnam in the highest regard and have worked in support of the Vietnamese-American community in this country at every opportunity.

I will continue to condemn those who unfairly mistreated us. But out of respect to a great number of people whom I hold in very high regard, I will no longer use the term that has caused such discomfort.

I deeply regret any pain I may have caused by my choice of words. I apologize and renounce all language that is bigoted and offensive, which is contrary to all that I represent and believe.

So, to sum up:

Your contention: McCain hates all Asian people because of his use of a particular term which "is" racist.

My answer:

1/Linguistic terms do not have absolute meanings.

2/"Gooks" has a history of being used in reference to Communist military or para-military units during the Indochina war (and not to the entirety of the Asian ethnic group)

3/Suggesting McCain "hates all Asian people" is simply demagogic, difamatory, slanderous garbage spread by hyperactive left-wing extremists.

[Snorri1234]

And your semantic interpretation is that McCain meant he literally hated all Asian people.

The fact that you think that I think this pretty much means you didn't actually read my post.

Furthermore, the term "gooks" was in wide use to refer to AVN enemy amongst US forces in Nam. I wasn't used to describe ARVN, or South Korean battle groups. It described NVA and NLF forces

And koreans, and japanese, and pretty much any south-east asians enemy.

Also, it is nowadays used as derogatory slang for any asian person. I guarantee you that any asian american will be offended if you call him a gook. The fact that you fail to realise this is a testament to your ignorance.

McCain deliberately specified it only reffered to his NVA captors (which should be clear anyway, but this great man's time was wasted by arrogant little arses like you, forcing him to issue this press release):

Holy shit? How the f*ck would it be clear?

If I said "I will always hate gay people." do you think anyone will understand that I'm merely referring to the guys who raped a friend of mine? (Example ofcourse, I don't know anyone who got raped by a homosexual.)

Your contention: McCain hates all Asian people because of his use of a particular term which "is" racist.

Congratulations on missing the point.

1/Linguistic terms do not have absolute meanings.

Ofcourse not. This is why people are offended by the term "gook". Because they don't actually think it is referring to the Korean enemy in the Korean war.

2/"Gooks" has a history of being used in reference to Communist military or para-military units during the Indochina war (and not to the entirety of the Asian ethnic group)

Utter, utter fail. It not only has a history of being used to reference the enemy in vietnam, but also to any south-east asian in any war the USA has fought. In fact, if you are going to claim he used the historic term, it would be logical to assume he's talking about japanese or fillipinos.

More recently however, it has been used to refer to all asian people.

3/Suggesting McCain "hates all Asian people" is simply demagogic, difamatory, slanderous garbage spread by hyperactive left-wing extremists.

I see your thesaurus has been dusted off.




I am going to put my entire post into a few sentences, as I know that you have a hard time reading big blocks of words so just guess at what people are saying.


McCain is not a racist. He's just an idiot for not guessing the impact of his words.

This does matter because he is running for president, and I believe presidents should be more carefull with their words. This is not the 1950s where the USA ruled pretty much the entire world.

The question here is not about what McCain meant, but about what the people thought he meant. So the interpretation by the various people who read about it is way more important than what McCain himself thought he meant. Noone thinks McCain is really much of a racist, it's just that the man is running for President of the United States.

[SolidLuigi]

Thank you Snorri for doing all the explaining/debating for me while I was at work, heh. Couldn't have said it any better myself. Actually, you said it 10 times better than I could ever have typed it all out, I tend to go off on tangents.

[Napoleon Ier]

3/Suggesting McCain "hates all Asian people" is simply demagogic, difamatory, slanderous garbage spread by hyperactive left-wing extremists.

I see your thesaurus has been dusted off.

The fact you had to look them up doesn't mean I did.

I am going to put my entire post into a few sentences, as I know that you have a hard time reading big blocks of words so just guess at what people are saying.


McCain is not a racist. He's just an idiot for not guessing the impact of his words.

This does matter because he is running for president, and I believe presidents should be more carefull with their words. This is not the 1950s where the USA ruled pretty much the entire world.

The question here is not about what McCain meant, but about what the people thought he meant. So the interpretation by the various people who read about it is way more important than what McCain himself thought he meant. Noone thinks McCain is really much of a racist, it's just that the man is running for President of the United States.

It's amusing to see you flip-flop again as your pathetic views are slowly ground into the intellectual dirt they are.

Ok. So now he's no longer a racist, only "not aware" of the implications of the terms he's using (which you've at least, or so I think, accepted, don't have any absolute significance).

I'll call, right now, my interrogator that tortured me and my friends a gook, OK, and you can quote me...[his captors] were cruel, mean, vicious, sometimes sadistic people. And "gook" is the kindest description I can give them, the most printable, I hate the gooks, and I will hate them for as long as I live.

'

Woops snorri...looks like if we bother to see the specific quote, it's just jumped-up little latte liberals getting their panties in a frill again. Damn shame they can't be forced to take an sa-80 in their shoulder and deploy to Helmand to do something useful for once any more.

So McCain makes it clear that the NVA were cruel people. Well, they genocided over 2 million of their own people and Cambodians, without even counting the millions more that died in the flight of the boat people, or the tens of thousands of French Marine Infantry, Legionnaires, French Union volunteers and US Airmen that died in horrific conditions in their prison camps. Is that wrong?

I reported, you decide

[InkL0sed]

wtf is this about flip-flopping? I've actually read this thread, Napoleon, and I'm not gonna let you get away with that.

This is not about whether torture is horrible or that it is understandable that McCain feels ill will, but about whether someone who casually insults an entire race is really fit to run for president.

And he never said anything different.

By the way, I was actually kind of agreeing with you at first. But I think your famed resorting to name-calling as you have demonstrated once again has killed your argument.

Personally, I don't care whether McCain is racist or not; I don't think he should be President anyway, so it doesn't bother me.

[Napoleon Ier]

wtf is this about flip-flopping? I've actually read this thread, Napoleon, and I'm not gonna let you get away with that.

This is not about whether torture is horrible or that it is understandable that McCain feels ill will, but about whether someone who casually insults an entire race is really fit to run for president.

And he never said anything different.

By the way, I was actually kind of agreeing with you at first. But I think your famed resorting to name-calling as you have demonstrated once again has killed your argument.

Personally, I don't care whether McCain is racist or not; I don't think he should be President anyway, so it doesn't bother me.

He starts off by suggested McCain is a racist.

Then he says:

McCain is not a racist.

Go figure.

Of course if it's name calling you object to, no-one is more guilty of that than snorri, who again, like so many leftists of his variety, think that opponents can be dismissed out of hand regardless of policy should the mere suggestion they are racist crop up, and hence frequently grossly misuse the term.

But perhaps I can do the same...snorri, I'm sure you'll want to explain to me Obama's links to Rev. Wright?

[Snorri1234]

It's amusing to see you flip-flop again as your pathetic views are slowly ground into the intellectual dirt they are.

I see, instead of you admitting that you didn't read my post, you say I flipflopped. Well, feel free to point out where I ever said McCain was a racist.
Looks like you're arguing against a position you just made up again, Nappy. If you hadn't quoted me I would've been confused as to who it was you're actually arguing against. Because your points sure don't respond to mine.

Ok. So now he's no longer a racist, only "not aware" of the implications of the terms he's using (which you've at least, or so I think, accepted, don't have any absolute significance).

No really, my whole point is that those meanings he doesn't know about have quite a lot of significance.

Gooks, to many asians, is just like the word nigger to black people. It's offensive and any person who uses it now is bound to thread on a few toes.

So McCain makes it clear that the NVA were cruel people.

By calling them gooks, a slang-term for asians.

Well, they genocided over 2 million of their own people and Cambodians, without even counting the millions more that died in the flight of the boat people, or the tens of thousands of French Marine Infantry, Legionnaires, French Union volunteers and US Airmen that died in horrific conditions in their prison camps. Is that wrong?

The vietcong were horrible in the war. Does that mean it's wise to refer to them as gooks when you're running for president of the united states?

[Snorri1234]

wtf is this about flip-flopping? I've actually read this thread, Napoleon, and I'm not gonna let you get away with that.

This is not about whether torture is horrible or that it is understandable that McCain feels ill will, but about whether someone who casually insults an entire race is really fit to run for president.

And he never said anything different.

By the way, I was actually kind of agreeing with you at first. But I think your famed resorting to name-calling as you have demonstrated once again has killed your argument.

Personally, I don't care whether McCain is racist or not; I don't think he should be President anyway, so it doesn't bother me.

He starts off by suggested McCain is a racist.

Ah, I see where the confusion is. You think that casually insulting has to be an active thing. That the person who is doing the insulting has to know he is being insulting.

In this, you're probably the only one in the entire world.

Of course if it's name calling you object to, no-one is more guilty of that than snorri, who again, like so many leftists of his variety, think that opponents can be dismissed out of hand regardless of policy should the mere suggestion they are racist crop up, and hence frequently grossly misuse the term.

If anything I've seen many more right-wingers use the term incorrectly. Like people saying they're not racists because they aren't insulting a race. Which I always find hilarious untill I realise they're not joking.

But perhaps I can do the same...snorri, I'm sure you'll want to explain to me Obama's links to Rev. Wright?

Actually, I'm just reading up on it. I missed it, seeing as I rarely follow the US presidential campaign.

[SolidLuigi]

I'll call, right now, my interrogator that tortured me and my friends a gook, OK, and you can quote me...[his captors] were cruel, mean, vicious, sometimes sadistic people. And "gook" is the kindest description I can give them, the most printable, I hate the gooks, and I will hate them for as long as I live.

'

Woops snorri...looks like if we bother to see the specific quote, it's just jumped-up little latte liberals getting their panties in a frill again. Damn shame they can't be forced to take an sa-80 in their shoulder and deploy to Helmand to do something useful for once any more.

So McCain makes it clear that the NVA were cruel people. Well, they genocided over 2 million of their own people and Cambodians, without even counting the millions more that died in the flight of the boat people, or the tens of thousands of French Marine Infantry, Legionnaires, French Union volunteers and US Airmen that died in horrific conditions in their prison camps. Is that wrong?

I reported, you decide

So if I get captured, and I decide to call the captors N-words or some other derogatory word for a specific race, then that makes it not racist? It's still a racist term even with the surrounding quote.

[heavycola]

So McCain makes it clear that the NVA were cruel people. Well, they genocided over 2 million of their own people and Cambodians, without even counting the millions more that died in the flight of the boat people, or the tens of thousands of French Marine Infantry, Legionnaires, French Union volunteers and US Airmen that died in horrific conditions in their prison camps. Is that wrong?

I reported, you decide

The NVA were one of the most caring and honourable fighting forces the world has ever seen. I believe your "agenda" has just been exposed. Good day, sir.

[Napoleon Ier]

I'll call, right now, my interrogator that tortured me and my friends a gook, OK, and you can quote me...[his captors] were cruel, mean, vicious, sometimes sadistic people. And "gook" is the kindest description I can give them, the most printable, I hate the gooks, and I will hate them for as long as I live.

'

Woops snorri...looks like if we bother to see the specific quote, it's just jumped-up little latte liberals getting their panties in a frill again. Damn shame they can't be forced to take an sa-80 in their shoulder and deploy to Helmand to do something useful for once any more.

So McCain makes it clear that the NVA were cruel people. Well, they genocided over 2 million of their own people and Cambodians, without even counting the millions more that died in the flight of the boat people, or the tens of thousands of French Marine Infantry, Legionnaires, French Union volunteers and US Airmen that died in horrific conditions in their prison camps. Is that wrong?

I reported, you decide

So if I get captured, and I decide to call the captors N-words or some other derogatory word for a specific race, then that makes it not racist? It's still a racist term even with the surrounding quote.

The difference is that "nigger" only ever applied to the race, never to a group of combattants, like "gook" did and does in McCain's quote.

Snorri, you can actually tenuously claim you never intended to attribute racism to McCain, though even a little reading between your lines reveals that the putrid odour of that implication surrounds them.

My original argument, was however, with luigo, who said, quite categorically, that:

it is...racism. That being said, someone who is held as a prisoner by asians can certainly hate them all, everyone has a right to their beliefs. But when that person is running for President, I don't think racism is a good quality, no matter what influenced it.

That quote and to a lesser extent your first post both had the strong suggestion that words are void of any relativistic semantical connotations, and crucially in Luigi's post, that McCain is a racist.

[SolidLuigi]

sorry when I hear someone say something racist, I tend to think they are racist until they prove otherwise

[SolidLuigi]

unless it's an obvious joke or such

[Napoleon Ier]

unless it's an obvious joke or such

McCain's statement, broadly speaking, could be categorized as being of the "or such" variety, in that he used a term you may find derogatory to an entire race in reference to a brutal, sadistic, communist enemy.

[Napoleon Ier]

So McCain makes it clear that the NVA were cruel people. Well, they genocided over 2 million of their own people and Cambodians, without even counting the millions more that died in the flight of the boat people, or the tens of thousands of French Marine Infantry, Legionnaires, French Union volunteers and US Airmen that died in horrific conditions in their prison camps. Is that wrong?

I reported, you decide

The NVA were one of the most caring and honourable fighting forces the world has ever seen. I believe your "agenda" has just been exposed. Good day, sir.

In that they very kindly anally raped prisoners before submitting them to cruel and unusual forms of punishment?

[heavycola]

So McCain makes it clear that the NVA were cruel people. Well, they genocided over 2 million of their own people and Cambodians, without even counting the millions more that died in the flight of the boat people, or the tens of thousands of French Marine Infantry, Legionnaires, French Union volunteers and US Airmen that died in horrific conditions in their prison camps. Is that wrong?

I reported, you decide

The NVA were one of the most caring and honourable fighting forces the world has ever seen. I believe your "agenda" has just been exposed. Good day, sir.

In that they very kindly anally raped prisoners before submitting them to cruel and unusual forms of punishment?

You're only calling it anal rape to make a point. Why not try a bit of objectivity for a change?

[Napoleon Ier]

So McCain makes it clear that the NVA were cruel people. Well, they genocided over 2 million of their own people and Cambodians, without even counting the millions more that died in the flight of the boat people, or the tens of thousands of French Marine Infantry, Legionnaires, French Union volunteers and US Airmen that died in horrific conditions in their prison camps. Is that wrong?

I reported, you decide

The NVA were one of the most caring and honourable fighting forces the world has ever seen. I believe your "agenda" has just been exposed. Good day, sir.

In that they very kindly anally raped prisoners before submitting them to cruel and unusual forms of punishment?

You're only calling it anal rape to make a point. Why not try a bit of objectivity for a change?

Don't be silly. Friedman-Lerner Symmetry Theorem proves the breakdown of objectivity curves in all elastic market conditions.

[Snorri1234]

Snorri, you can actually tenuously claim you never intended to attribute racism to McCain, though even a little reading between your lines reveals that the putrid odour of that implication surrounds them.

FUN TIME WITH NAPPY:

Tip 12:

Say anything, doesn't matter what. He will twist it and exagerrate it untill the point is something he can disagree with without having to overthink his precious worldview. Words like "casual" will get a meaning entirely different from it's present meaning in the english-speaking world, while he continues to assert that what the intended meaning is is more important than what the receiving end perceives. If you make a valid point and he sees no way to twist it, he ignores it and claims that because he thinks one part of your post is wrong it makes the entire post wrong.

It's like arguing with a brick wall.